Buttercup
by Kyn
Summary: A madman is raising a child; And she's not the one having temper tantrums and throwing things. ON INDEFINITE HIATUS.
1. Chapter 1

This story builds slowly. If you like the writing style but can't figure out where it's going, give it four chapters or so. I've got a plan, and I know what I'm doing. :)

You should also know that I've no big investment in sticking to the canon.

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><p>Marcy Adams was five years old. It was the first day of kindergarten, and her father was a mess. He stalked back and forward across the floor of their home, his hands shaking, mumbling incoherently to himself. Now and then he would twitch violently, or unleash a curse. Mercy covered her ears whenever he did this, just as he'd instructed her.<p>

Their house was built within the shell of an old warehouse, with each room spaced from all the others, each like an individual set for a movie. Their kitchen was along the westward wall and opened up into the largest open space of the warehouse. It was cuddled up gently under an overhang, which gave it the feeling of safety, and it served as the center or nexus of the home. Marcy knew this entire arrangement was unusual only because she had seen no similar homes on the television set, just as she knew it was unusual that she possessed no mother, and no siblings.

The family kitchen had an islet with bar stools drawn up to it. Marcy was sitting on one, her legs dangling high above the floor. She was all dressed up for school in a new jean jacket with pink flowers embroidered around the hems. Her flower-printed backpack was perched colorfully on her back. A new lunch pail, emblazoned with her favorite cartoon characters, lay open upon the kitchen islet. Halfway through making her lunch, her father had thrown a fit.

As she watched, he stalked back over to the kitchen, picked up the knife rack, and proceeded to hurl kitchen knife after kitchen knife at a dart board conveniently placed within throwing distance. He never missed. He ruined one of his good knives by splitting its handle with the thrown blade of another. He swore. Marcy covered her ears.

Her father screamed when he threw the last knife, a deep primal scream. He seized onto a pile of dishes and sent them crashing to the ground, shattering into countless pieces. He threw the microwave, and every pot and pan he could find, and screamed, and then just stood there, breathing heavily, his shoulders bowed and his head lowered. He was still shaking.

A long moment passed in this fashion. Marcy thought that she had never seen him so upset. Not for the first time, she wished she could sense her father the way she sensed other people. She wanted to know what was wrong.

"We could move," he said, and she could tell by the tone of his voice that he was very, very sick. It was a quiet voice, a high and child-like voice, cute and pouting, laughing and demented. "We could move again, lie about your age, another change of name, another change of face..."

Marcy frowned. While she had never been particularly fond of her most recent name (Her favorite last name had been Calypso), she had been looking forward to the first day of kindergarten for what seemed like forever.

"It wouldn't be hard," he purred. "You could stay home a few more years..." He slowly turned to look at her, acid eyes glinting. His voice dropped in volume and shot up even further in pitch, into an almost fearful, uncertain whine. "Couldn't you, Buttercup?"

Marcy Adams hesitated. After a moment, she pushed her way out of her stool and carefully approached him. He didn't move at first but then slowly turned to meet her. His quivering didn't cease. "Or," he cooed, hoping to find a solution, "I could blow up the school! I could, you know, it would be easy." He moved to kneel as she reached him, and he was forced to lift his head slightly so that he could keep her in sight. He licked his lips, and reached forward to touch her. "What do you say? Buttercup?"

Marcy lifted her hands and touched her father's face. Her fingers brushed over the familiar scars in his cheeks, and traced up slightly into his curling yellow hair. She looked him in the eyes, slowly leaned towards him, and touched her forehead to his. He grimaced, lips pressing into a thin line. "Buttercup," he whined, realizing that he wasn't going to get his way. His eyelids lowered to a half-closed state, and he nuzzled gently against her.

"It'll be okay, daddy," she promised him. Yellow-green eyes shot to hers. His forehead creased in an expression of pain. Then he darted forward, wrapping his arms tightly around her and clutching her against him. He smothered his face into her blonde hair and inhaled her scent. She couldn't help but giggle slightly, and hugged him back as tight as she could.

When he spoke again, his voice had dropped an active, into a natural, warm, rumbling bass. "Alright, squirt. You win. He pulled back and while his eyes were somewhat pained, his face was smiling. "Geez, your first day of school. There you go, making me feel old."

"You're not old, daddy," she told him. "But you scared me... You broke a lot of stuff." He blinked and then glanced around them, looking at the shattered plates, dented pots, and broken kitchen appliances scattered around them.

"Oh," he murmured thoughtfully, as if having forgotten them. He evaluated the unfortunate condition of his kitchen and then looked back to Marcy, an apologetic expression on his face. "I'm so sorry, squirt... I didn't mean for you to see that..."

"It's okay daddy," she said.

"No, it's not. You were right to be afraid." He trailed off for a moment, but then ruffled her hair. "But look at you! Don't you look snazzy, all dressed up for school?" He slipped into an effeminate lisp that had nothing to do with insanity. "That jacket, those shoes, those pants! They just look fa-a-bulous!" She broke out laughing. "But this hair!" he cried, combing through it. "Oh no, this will never do, we need some stars, some glitter-"

"Da-ddy!" she laughed in protest, play-fighting against him. "You've got to make my lunch." He dropped the act and scooped her off the ground with one arm, giving a deep laugh as he did so. She squealed in delight. "Ah, that's right. You caught me, squirt; I was stalling for time!" He plopped her back in one of the stools and then slipped gracefully around the table, settling back to work on her lunch pail. "Alright, now, where was I?"

He picked up the butter knife and went back to smoothing mayonnaise over her turkey sandwich. "Mayonnaise- check! Lettuce..." he spun around and threw open the refrigerator, and conducted a head of lettuce back to the kitchen islet by tossing it into the air and keeping it afloat through a mixture of juggling and sleight of hand. He bounced it against his boot heel, knee, and shoulder until it finally came to rest on his cutting board. He pulled one of his ubiquitous knives out of his back pocket, and quickly cut off a layer of lettuce. "Check!" Marcy clapped.

He cooked like a show chef, tossing his vegetables nimbly through the air, and catching them on his utensils. Her sandwich was assembled in no time, and was soon followed by fruit, vegetables, a bottle of chocolate milk and a pack of fruit gelatin for dessert. He packed the articles carefully into her lunch pail, closed it, and then slid it in front of her and planted his hands on his hips. "Tada!" He beamed.

She laughed and held the pail to her chest. "Thanks daddy," she said. "I should go to the bus stop, the bus will come soon."

"That's right," he said, and he quickly hopped around the islet to help her out of the chair. "I'll walk you there." She nodded with a smile and placed her little hand in one of his much larger, calloused ones. At the door he paused to study her one more time. "Do you have your lucky card?" he asked.

Marcy nodded, "Of course!" and pulled the card out of her pocket to show him. Then she tucked it away again. Her father licked his thumb and smoothed back some of her stray hair so that it lay neatly behind her ears. After straightening her jacket and favoring her with a beaming smile, he rested a hand on her shoulder and guided her out of the warehouse doors, out to the bus stop.

He waited beside her, and squeezed her shoulder affectionately when the bus arrived. She felt his personality crack slightly as she slipped free of his arms and boarded the vehicle. His smile became a mask, and the rest of him plummeted. He waved to her as the bus shifted into drive and slowly sped away. She waved back, because she already missed him, because she was nervous about her first day, and because she knew he needed it.


	2. Chapter 2

Marcy hopped along beside her father as they walked through the mall. They were on a winter shopping trip. Every time they moved, Marcy and her father left the majority of their possessions behind them. So it was that the little family required new holiday decorations, and more winter clothing.

It was a lovely time of year for Marcy. She loved being at the mall, seeing so many people and wondering at so many interesting items.

"I love the mall!" she chirped happily. Her father laughed at her enthusiasm.

"More than school?" he asked. Marcy didn't pick up that there were ulterior reasons for his questions. He kept his voice appropriately jovial to hide them.

"School's great!" she cheered. "But I like shopping more, it's special!"

He laughed again.

Marcy had always thought her father looked a little odd without scars. Whenever the duo left home, he hid the tell-tale markings with bits of false skin and makeup. He was quite an artist with makeup, actually. Marcy studied the edges of his mouth as he laughed, but could not detect so much as a hint of damaged flesh.

"Right now it's decorated for Halloween," her father told her with a mischievous look. "But we'll come back near Christmas. They'll have a gargantuan tree here, tall as that ceiling up there!"

"No!" she cooed in delighted disbelief.

"Really!" he laughed.

Marcy smiled up at where the tree would be. She could feel the shade of its presence already, see the edges of its ghostly shape. Her father blinked at her, but she did not see. She was thinking.

Marcy loved the mall, but being there was somewhat disorienting. She could sense the hundreds of people around her, could feel the reverberations of their natures, each brushing against the other, each a small thread in a vast potential future. The beating thrum of the future spun around her and whispered through her mind.

When they'd first entered the premises, she'd been overwhelmed, and her father had held her against him for a moment, to steady her. Even now, she was even slightly confused about whether an event she had just witnessed was in the present or in the future.

"Squirt?" She blinked and beamed up at her father. He gave her shoulder a squeeze. "Let's head over to that store, we need to get some new coats."

"Kay!"

The coat! The coat, oh what a wonderful coat! Marcy's eyes lit up the moment she laid eyes on it. With a delighted gasp she hopped over to where it was, feeling the soft material of its exterior, kneading the underlying goose down. It was love at first sight.

"What do you have there, squirt?" her father asked, pushing past several rows of bloated, garish, cotton-stuffed winter garments

"I want this one!" she cried delightedly, and ran her fingers over the coat's beautiful floral embroidery work. It reminded her of her autumn jacket, of which she was also particularly fond.

She didn't see her father wince, but she heard the hesitation in his voice. "That one's a little expensive, kiddo," he told her, glancing at the price tag.

"But can I have it? I really like it!" she cooed happily, studying the coat and struggling to get it off its hanger. She wanted to try it on. "I love it! Help me, Daddy? I want to try it!"

Her father glanced around the store. When he didn't immediately leap to her assistance, Marcy turned an inquisitive look back at him. He had a cautiously worried look on his face. "Daddy?" she asked, hushing her voice even though she couldn't see the cause for concern.

He blinked, turning wide green eyes on her almost as if in surprise. He tilted his head to the side and then came up, and helped her pull the coat off the hanger. He unzipped it, helped her get each of her little arms through its sleeves, zipped it back up, and straightened it a little. Marcy laughed and hugged herself; it was a very warm coat.

Her father stood back and told her to spin around. By the time she'd made a complete circle, he was wearing a conspiratorial grin. "Oh, alright," he laughed. "Give me a second."

"Yay!" she cried in glee as he knelt down and reached into one of his boots. A moment later he pulled free a few one-hundred dollar bills, and passed them to her.

"There you go. But no more big purchases, okay?" he admonished. Marcy laughed and hugged him. "Thank you! Thank you daddy, you're the best!"

He laughed, hugging her back and momentarily pressing his face into her hair. "So are you!" he told her. Then he tapped her nose, and kissed the top of her head, and sent her off to pay for the new coat.

That was when she saw the bunny in the pet store window across the hall.


	3. Chapter 3

Two problems plagued the Adams household. Firstly, Marcy Adams did not know what she wanted to be for Halloween. Secondly, Mr. Adams was getting desperate.

Marcy's father had gone out and bought no less than seven enormous pumpkins. He set them down proudly in front of her soon after she returned home from school.

"Daddy! she exclaimed. She'd be on the verge of practicing her letters for school in the morning, but she dropped everything to come over and appraise the giant orange gourds. She pat their swollen sides and then laughed delightedly. "Why did you buy so many?"

"Two of them are for carving, the others are for pies," he cooed happily. "I thought you could take off school tomorrow! We can carve pumpkins, bake pumpkin pie, maybe work on your costume a little..."

Marcy blinked in surprised. "But I don't want to miss school, Daddy. I like to play with the other kids, and we're doing crafts tomorrow."

His face dropped almost immediately, and he flinched slightly. "Oh," he murmured softly, and then looked dejectedly down at his pumpkins. Marcy blinked and straightened up a little. She took a moment to study her father, who seemed too lost in thought to hide his own disappointment. The expression on his face seemed very haunted. Marcy frowned. She quickly hurried around the pumpkins and came up to hug his legs. When he didn't immediately stoop to hug her, she knew that something was not quite right.

"Daddy?" she asked. Yellowed eyes drifted up to her face, but didn't focus on her. "Daddy, I heard Mrs. Evans talking. Mrs. Evans is my teacher, remember? I heard her talking with Mrs. Kauffman about... about how the grown ups are trying to plan the Kindergarten Halloween party. Mrs. Kauffman said it wasn't going very well. She said the P... The... P... The P... T... something didn't have enough people in it!"

Her father had slowly come back to himself as she spoke, and now his eyes widened in thoughtful curiosity. "The PTA?" he asked.

"I think so," she cooed, happy to see that he had come out of his malaise. "Daddy, could you help them with the Halloween party? We could make pumpkin pie for it, and... and carve pumpkins with my friends!"

Mr. Adams stared at her in blatant wonderment. It was clear that he had no idea what to say for the longest time, that the idea of joining a Parent-Teacher Association had never once crossed his mind. It simply hadn't entered into his understanding of the realm of possibilities.

"Please, Daddy?" she begged. "Please, please, please, please, please?"

"That would be okay?" he asked her. "Me coming to your school... that would be okay?"

"Yes!" she exclaimed delightedly. "Then you can meet all my friends! They all get jealous when they see my lunch and I told them about how great a cook you are! But a mean girl named Julie, she didn't believe me! She said guys can't cook! I told her she didn't know what she was talking about, but now the other kids aren't sure who to believe. You can come and make pies for them and then they're sure to know!"

Mr. Adams fidgeted, and then slowly knelt down. He took her little hands in his own and looked up at her. Marcy didn't understand why he looked so frightened, so stunned, so overwhelmed. "You brag about my cooking?" he asked, and his voice almost cracked.

"Of course!" she laughed. But then her face quickly became worried, and she looked at her father uncertainly. "Was that wrong? What's wrong, Daddy? Did I do something wrong?"

He laughed, moaned, and shuddered all at the same time, dropping his head for a moment and breathing heavily. Marcy realized with a start that he was on the verge of crying. Her eyes went wide and she pushed forward into his arms and hugged him tightly. "Daddy!" she exclaimed, frightened. "Daddy, what's wrong!"

He hugged her against him then, pressing his face firmly into her hair. She felt a dampness. He really was crying! Why? Marcy desperately wished she could sense what was wrong. She smothered her face into his shoulder and hugged him tightly about the neck. After a moment he sat down with her and pulled her into his lap, rocking her and clutching her tightly to his chest.

"Nothing's wrong," he whispered at long last, but his voice cracked slightly, so he licked his lips and repeated himself. "Nothing's wrong. I'm happy."

"Then why are you crying?" she whimpered, still very alarmed.

"I'm happy," he promised her, his voice stronger now. "Sometimes people cry happy tears."

"Happy... tears...?" she asked, lifting her head to frown at him. "Why do that do that?"

"Because... because they're too happy to laugh," he told her huskily. After a moment he lifted his face and wiped his nose and eyes with a shirt sleeve, and then kissed her cheek and cuddled her to him again. "I love you, honey."

"I love you too, Daddy," She mumbled honestly. An idea occurred to her, and she tried to look up at his face again. "Did you forget?"

He didn't answer, but he squeezed her a little tighter. Marcy frowned. She wormed an arm free, and lifted it up to touch his face. He pulled back a little so that he could look at her. For a moment, Marcy just dabbed at his tears in confusion. "I love you more than all the schools in the whole world, Daddy," she promised him, because she did not know what else to say.

He choked, sputtered, and then laughed and hugged her to him almost crushingly, as tight as he ever had. "I'll do it," he told her with a laugh that was half sob. "I'll help with the Halloween party. I'll call the school tonight, and get hold of your t-teacher..."

Her face brightened, although she was still very much concerned about his tears. "You will?" She beamed. "You will? Yes! We're going to have the best Halloween party ever! All my friends are going to be so jealous that I have the best daddy at all. And I can show you my artwork that the teacher hung up on the classroom walls! And where my chair and desk are, and the class pet... he's a chinchilla!"

Her father didn't speak, but a gentle smile worked over his face. He listened to her list all the things that she would show him, before she suddenly cut off.

"Can we bring Nibbles?" she asked thoughtfully. "We can dress him up in a costume!"

Mr. Adams looked over her head, at the rabbit cage he'd built beside their kitchen. He smiled and nuzzled into his daughter's hair. His eyes were still a little reddened. "Of course," he told her. "Of course we can." She smiled happily and hugged him back for awhile, glad to see that he was feeling much better.

"I'm thinking about my costume," she told him. "I thought about being a superhero, but then I thought I want to do something with lots of makeup because I think it will look really cool! So maybe I should be a zombie!"

He laughed. "Which superhero were you thinking of?" he asked. "Did you want to Bunny Woman?"

"Daddy, there's no such person!" she told him with a smile.

"But you have to dress up Nibbles to be your trusty crime-fighting partner!" he cooed.

"Oh yeah!" she exclaimed. "I think he'd make a good ghost, if I was a zombie. I was thinking... I like Spider Girl... but then I thought maybe if I wanted to be really scary, I could be a supervillain!"

"Supervillain? But you need a trusty sidekick! Are you going to be Black Cat and dress Nibbles up as a Kitty? The poor bunny would be terrified of his own reflection!"

"I wouldn't want to be Black Cat!" she cried. "She tries to hurt Spiderman!"

"Ooh, so you have a crush on Spiderman and wanted to be his giiirrlfriend?" he trilled happily. "I dunno, I'm gonna have to have a talk with that boy..."

"Daadddy!" she laughed and stuck out her tongue. "Grossss! Everyone dresses up like those supervillains, I want my costume to be really... all mine! Maybe I could be... could be... Poison Ivy?"

Her father seemed to jump slightly at her choice, but then he burst out laughing "You'll make the cutest Poison Ivy ever," he crooned delightedly, ruffling her hair. "I won't know how to make you scary, I'll just braid all sorts of flowers in your hair!"

She laughed and play-fought against him to make him stop mussing her hair. "Nnnnooo, I want to be scary!"

"But you'd make such an adorable Poison Ivy!" he protested. "We can dress Nibbles up as a sunflower!"

"I'm being a zombie!" she announced. "I'm being a scary zombie with sharp teeth, rawr, rawr!" He laughed and picked her up over his head. She squealed in delight and lifted out her arms, pretending she was flying. "I'm a zombie dragon!" she called, and made airplane noises and roars.

"Oh no, the zombie dragon!" he mock-screamed, and then jumped up and flew her all around the kitchen. He set her down atop a counter and playfully cringed away"Aaahh! Help meeeee!"

She laughed and pounced on his back. He caught her and let her crawl all over his shoulders as he pretended once to fall down, and then lifted her back up to fly around again. "Rawr, rawr! Vrrrrrooom!"


	4. Chapter 4

I debated for a very long time about whether I wanted to post this chapter. After writing it, I decided it didn't have enough dramatic tension in a way that was different from the previous three parts. It was more same-old, same-old. You see, this fiction was originally written with an agnostic audience in mind; the people I wrote it for were only told that it was about a well known comic book- movie antagonist. It was to be something they could enjoy reading even if they weren't familiar with the source material. Obviously, when writing for such an audience, I have to go a lot slower and be a lot more gentle than I have to be when I'm dealing with the fandom, and I have plenty of time to let things unfold slowly. I also have to explain the setting and give the audience a detailed mental picture of the characters.

So this here chapter served the purpose of driving home the answer to some of the basic Who What Where When How Why questions of the story for an uninformed audience. It's not as valuable a chapter when I give it to the fandom, I could just see everyone going "Yeah, uh-huh, we got it, get on with the story!"

Then I realized my reluctance to upload Part 4 was actually causing me not to write the rest of the story.

So I logged on about 3 minutes later and uploaded it for you. In a second draft, I could always go back and merge this with another chapter, or write another chapter for this to be merged with, after all.

Happy reading.

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><p>A zombie. A zombie. He could do a zombie. He had a good idea for how to get the makeup to simulate torn flesh.<p>

Mr. Adams knelt down beside the bathroom sink and rummaged around within. He pulled out a few boxes of high -rade makeup, spirit gum, and other accessories. As he looked at his supplies, he drummed his fingers on the top of one box. The PTA! He almost laughed. Such a life he lived! They couldn't have guessed, not in their wildest imaginings.

He smiled warmly, thinking about how he planned to do his daughter's costume. He had to make sure her zombie self wasn't too ugly, or she might get picked on. Ha! What a thing to worry about. He enjoyed worrying about it. His life was funny that way.

The TV rattled off the news of the day. The most alarming story was that Dr. Octopus had been spotted near a very sensitive science facility; other than that, the news was fairly dry for a big city like New York. Of course, the weather was colder than it ought to have been that year, and a big cold front was coming in from the west. He was glad he'd bought Marcy that new coat.

"I've just been told," exclaimed the news man suddenly, in an alarmed voice, "that a warehouse in northern New Jersey burst into flames at approximately eleven thirty this afternoon."

Mr. Adams lifted his head and gave something of an absurd and condescending smile. The warehouse owner in question had been trying to transport some black diamonds in secret. Apparently he hadn't wanted to pay off the correct people in the underground.

"The cause of the explosion is uncertain, but police authorities are flocking to the scene. Witnesses say that a strange woman dressed up like a cat in black leather was present at the location, but fled before she could be apprehended. Our reporter on the ground says that the woman's description did not fit with Black Cat's. It is possible that this elusive woman was Catwoman. This would be the seventh citing of either Catwoman or the Penguin outside of Gotham in a six month period."

Mr. Adams' mouth compressed into a thin line. He grasped the edge of his makeup box tightly, and then stood up and slowly walked to the bathroom door and peered out into his home. The TV was displaying images of a fiery warehouse taken by smart phone from the scene of the incident; The studio's helicopter crew hadn't arrived on scene yet. In one image a black-clad woman was clearly outlined against the blaze, her full red lips and shiny leather glistening in the orange light.

His eyes narrowed suspiciously, and he quickly ran through everything he knew about the warehouse in question. Did it have sister warehouses in New York? Was there any reason to believe this kind of trouble would strike closer to home? The archvillainess's grand robberies weren't of much interest to him, but New Jersey was a little too close for comfort. What temptation had those diamonds presented that something in Gotham couldn't offer? Gotham was so large, so corrupt, so vast that it could have succeeded and formed into its own, self-governing, hell-hole of a country. Surely someone like Catwoman had plenty of opportunities to steal trinkets closer to home.

He was probably being a little paranoid, reading into these events far too deeply, but he couldn't help it. His nervousness had paid off many times already. For a moment he considered pulling Marcy out of school, but then decided that doing so would be a gross overreaction. Still, one could never be too careful. He'd go and pick her up personally from class at the end of the day.

Then he remembered he'd been working on her zombie costume, and he quickly looked down at the makeup box in his hand. It was not the box he remembered picking up. Mr. Adam's jumped, staring at the box with wide eyes. He opened it almost without thinking and reached in, drawing out a can of green hairspray. He looked at it for a long moment, a smile working its way over his face.

He could have done a better job with the warehouse, really. There was an ancient jewelry collection being moved to Pittsburgh that night, and he would bet a hefty sum that Catwoman was even now on her way to obtain it. He could probably beat her to it. Maybe he'd blow the gems to pieces just to laugh at her pointless greed. On the other hand, he admitted a fondness for her internal anarchy. Perhaps he'd go and help her out; her odd mixture of apathy and fire was both liberating and delicious. She flung herself around from passion to passion with utter zeal and yet invested in nothing longer than a moment.

He could do it. A can of hairspray, a jar of white face paint, a splash of black mascara and a tube of red lipstick. It would be fun. He licked it lips, a strange high overcoming him as adrenaline rushed out to tingle in his fingertips, His muscles clenched and unclenched. Just do it! Have a blast- literally, if possible!

Have-... have...

He had pumpkin pies to bake.

Mr. Adams dropped the makeup box with a clatter, and stumbled backwards, covering his mouth with his hands. He look wide-eyed at the choice he had almost made, and how it had sneaked up on him. He stared at it, at the deceitful way in which it had presented itself, in the way he had almost failed to notice it

He was alone with it. It was him and the choice. There was no time to be weak, no time to cry. Marcy wasn't going to be back for hours; he needed to remind it who was in charge.

"No!" he told it forcefully, his voice a deep growl, tearing his hands away from his face and glaring angrily down at the makeup. "No. We don't need money," he hissed. "We're set, I made sure of that in Los Angeles. We haven't had a proper home since then. I'm not doing it- Not even for the usual shits and giggles!"

His own words smacked him back in the face; they were the wrong thing to say, and the Choice knew it. He cringed and then his face contorted into a vicious, lupine snarl. Damn the choice and damn what it had to say about him. He was the only noun present whose thoughts, words, or selections meant anything. And he had already chosen. His decision stood. He made the choice again, firmly, aggressively. He was not allowing or forbidding the actions of an outside force; he was a man and he had selected his own route, laughing in the face of fate, laughing at the laws of nature.

He did laugh. He laughed and sputtered, "I have a pie to bake! Shoo, shoo! I don't have time to argue philosophy with a personified metaphor for law." He smirked ironically, and licked his lips and the edges of his facial scars. "You could _never_ beat the avatar of _Chaos_." He grinned smugly, victoriously, and looked back towards the kitchen, where his pies were laid out. He'd turned on the oven before going to check out his makeup kits. He ought to get to baking, or at least turn the oven off if he was going to spend some more time considering Marcy's costume.

He walked towards the oven. The makeup kit lie forgotten on the floor. As he picked up a carving knife, the choice made one more bid for his attention, and for a moment he imagined Marcy with the carving knife buried up to the hilt between her eyes. He just laughed and set to cutting up the pumpkins with a relish. "I never deliberately intended to be masochistic..." he cooed smugly. A curl of his blond hair dripped down in front of his eyes, interrupting him, and he paused only for a moment to blow it out of his face; then he brought the carving knife down with a careful slash, cleaving the pumpkin in twain. "But I've got to say: this is all actually quite funny!"

Mr. Adams lifted up the carving knife and licked pumpkin juice from the edge. The taste was good; the pumpkin was perfectly ripe.

He set to baking with a happy little smirk.


	5. Chapter 5

Shortest chapter yet! It's mostly passive and starts off by sucking. What I knew was that I needed another cute intermediary chapter to calm down from the crazy in chapter 4 before introducing a new major character and starting to get the plot rolling. Unfortunately I had no idea what to write. So since this is an exercise in plotting and not in writing, I realized that it didn't matter how much it sucked or how short it was, just as long as I got down some basic ideas and at least established that I wanted something here. And when I let go of not knowing what to do, I got a nice cute little sequence at the end that worked well :)

Have fun! Oh and if any of you are holdouts from my Starcraft fanfiction and the Starcraft fandom, I've got some romantic comedy images of Mira Han and Matt Horner from Starcraft 2 that I just uploaded. They're just a wee bit NSFW, so I've put them in a folder named such. They're as sloppy as this fanfiction though so don't expect much ;)

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><p>Many of the children hadn't been able to procure good costumes for the party, and arrived dismayed and embarrassed to a realm of orange and black decorations and glowing spiders. But Mr. Adams, having thought of this contingency, was prepared. He provided each child with monstrous gloves, a party hat, and a cape. Then he had them stand in line, and one by one he carefully applied makeup to their little faces, turning them into cats, zombies, skeletons, and faeries.<p>

The whole time, Marcy had been beaming at him.

The feeling had been addicting. Was still addicting. He stayed with the PTA and proceeded to lead the organization and implementation of every activity from then on out. He helped plan school assemblies and field trips, bring in speakers, and even cheered the sports teams.

Mr. Adams was one of those goofy parents that was always waving excitedly at their child from behind the PTA counter. He thought, laughingly, that he was lucky Buttercup was only in Kindergarten, where such behavior was still acceptable from him.

Getting involved in the PTA had taken some craft. To begin with, the parents and teachers were happy but somewhat suspicious about why a previously unknown and uninvolved single father was suddenly interested in throwing his all into the planning process. Didn't he have a job? Didn't he have other commitments? Why the sudden interest in an elementary school? Despite their misgivings, their massive dearth of human and material resources had gotten him a spot in the decision making process.

A few minutes later, he found himself bouncing from grocery store to Halloween shop to party plaza, searching for all the necessary ingredients. Usually, Mr. Adams was frugal with his finances, out of the fear that a seemingly unemployed man with a lot of disposable cash might attract unwanted attention. But for Marcy's Halloween party, he decided to go all-out. Party hats, plats and cups, decorations, tomb stones, spiders, face makeup, capes, monstrous gloves, apples, cinnamon, and loads of flower and sugar were just some of the ingredients on the list.

He stole the party out from under the PTA's fingertips. Soon he was delegating the organization of countless little games and activities, and had an entire kindergarten's class worth of soccer moms on baking duty.

Apparently a number of single moms had been impressed, Marcy would tell him later. Mr. Adams made a face at the news. Marcy laughed.

"Daddy?" Marcy had asked him one evening. "Can you teach me how to ice skate?"

Mr. Adams blinked. Then he laughed. "I don't know how," he confessed. "I could get you lessons, would that work?"

Her face brightened in delight. "Only if you take them too," she told him.

Mr. Adams imagined blundering around on a strip of ice in white-laced skates with a bicycle helmet on, clinging desperately to the walls while his child skated circles around him. The image was hilarious. "I'm in," he laughed. "Why ice skates?" he inquired. "Did you take a liking to the figure skating competitions on TV or something?"

"No," she told him matter-of-factly, "I would like to learn to play ice hockey."

What? He looked concerned for only a moment, but then broke out laughing and scooped her up, hugging her and tumbling her over and up onto his shoulders. "Ice hockey!" he cried. "That's dangerous, you'll knock out all your teeth!"

"Nuh-uh!" she disagreed. "I'll be too tough for that!

He grinned up at her as she latched onto his hair and settled down on his shoulders. "But don't you want to be a delicate little princess and learn ballet? I thought you liked pink?"

"No, I'm too tough!" she squealed happily "And I do like pink. I'll be tough AND wear pink! Really light baby pink too! And then scary people will try to laugh at me, but BAM, I'll fight them off with my martial arts! Huaaahhh!" She did her best Jackie-Chan imitation. Then she learned near his ear and whispered to him sagaciously, "They will never see it coming!"

Mr. Adams reasoned that a significant subset of the world's funniest conversations were held between himself and his daughter. Or maybe that was just his paternal instinct speaking. He grinned broadly and took several long strides towards the cabinet where they kept a book of yellow pages. He was going to have a look at any ice skating rinks in the area. "So," he laughed, "you're going to be a tough, little, pink, tomboyish, kung-fu mastering, ice hockey-playing princess?

"I am! I'm a zombie, and a rock star, and a race car driver, and an astronaut!" she roared. "I'm Chuckalina Norris!"

He didn't make it to the yellow pages because he nearly died on the spot laughing.


	6. Chapter 6

Look! A little bit of plot! After this chapter I only have a very bare-bones idea of where I'm going and how I'm getting there. I know that I have successfully established the starting conditions of the story right now and I have to focus more strongly on the plot from now on than on further exposition. Still, it's gonna be hard for me to just write a story from start to finish. Cross your fingers, and maybe I'll make it!

* * *

><p>"Career day," Mr. Adams say slowly, wryly, tasting the words on his lips. It wasn't the first time he'd tasted them- he'd repeated them aloud many times that week- but he still could not decide what he thought of their flavor.<p>

"Like navigating a minefield," he rambled aloud. "They all want to know what I do. When I avoid the question, they get curious. If I acknowledge I am unemployed, they get even more curious. Most likely I'll have to tell a lie. But what am I, then? Still haven't decided. Such a procrastinator. Am I a retired chef? Banker? Lawyer? Stock trader? Professional juggler-slash-entertainment specialist?"

The last one he liked; it answered the most questions and provided the least information, yet at the same time it was also the most truthful. "Clown...?" he drawled, and oh how he would have _liked_ to use that one, but... no. Unnecessary risk.

He flicked through his mind for a humorous choice, and then did his best personification of a fictional character: "I'm an Architect." Then he broke down snickering. No, no, no, he wouldn't be able to hold a straight face with that one! He was tempted to run through a mock introduction of himself using his _actual_ credentials right there in the car... but something about the idea of doing so spooked him; as if recalling too much of that life might accidentally bring it back.

The difficulty wasn't in pulling the deception off, he knew; he was very multi-talented and had the knowledge and vocabulary to masquerade as any of his possible 'professions.' No, the difficulty was in finding one so subtly ironic that it would not give away the truth, but at the same time would be appropriately funny.

At last he decided he had once been the assistant creative director for a small Gotham firm that did freelance work for Wayne Enterprises in the public relations department.

The moment Marcy's school came into view, he knew something was wrong. There were cars lining the streets for miles around. Camera crews were present. A chill swept over him, but he pushed it aside. Easy. This didn't mean Marcy was in any danger. Mr. Adams drove as close as he could and was relieved to find that the PTA had been able to hold a spot open for him close to the school.

But when he got out of his car, the sense of dread only worsened. His acid green eyes swept over the field of cars, marking licenses plates by their state and county. "Mr. Adams!" called one of the prominent PTA members, a round-faced young woman with a sort of ugly- but nevertheless gentle- smile. "We tried to reach you last night, but Marcy said the two of you had been at the movies, and we weren't able to get through to your phone! You'll _never_ believe this! At about five last night, we got a call from a very prominent business man who said he was willing to come speak at our school today! It was so last minute that we barely had time to accommodate him- but it looks like you taught all of use old ladies a thing or two about management!"

Mr. Adams looked to her as if peering through a mist, his eyes wide and evidencing quiet confusion. His head was numb.

"Ah! There's Ms. Terrence, I've got to tell her. But Mr. Adams, you'll _never_ believe who it is! Go look!"

He watched the woman go, blinking, numb, unfeeling. Then he looked back at the crowd ahead of him, thronging around the school play area. Panic seized in his chest, crushing his heart.

Where was Buttercup?

He took one step forward, hesitantly, uncertainly. Then the panic wrapped its greedy fingers through the whole of his internals. Desperation flushed out his thoughts. He shot into the ground, pushing and pressing and shoving through reporters, bystanders, parents, and children alike. Several people tried to talk to them. He shouldered past them mercilessly.

Where is she? Where _is she!_

He bumped into a plump woman and her drink spilled on her shirt. He didn't stop to apologize. One or two persons glanced his way; the rest ignored the minor commotion. Mr. Adams pushed past a eighth-grade basketball player, and then the boiling panic stirring up his insides suddenly froze.

A Mr. Wayne stood across the room, curiously glancing in the direction of the spilled drink. A rational part of him had already decided there was no threat to be found there; but an instinctive part had needed him to look. With nothing to obscure their lines of sight, Wayne and Adams saw each other immediately.

Mr. Adams took in a sharp, hard breath, lifting his head slightly, yellowed eyes widening.

_WHERE IS SHE?_

His insides twisted, ripped his gaze away from the _danger_,and sent it hunting for his prize. He darted back into the walls of the crowd, vanishing from the enemy's sight.

This time, instinct knew more than rationality. Wayne stiffened, looking frantically back and forward. Had he imagined that? Impossible! After all this time- No! He had _not_ imagined it! He had to move! He backed up, coughing a polite apology. He suddenly felt ill, he'd have to retire early, he-

That familiar frame, as lithe as an acrobat and yet somehow brutish like an animal, rippled through the crowd. It swooped down, pounced upon a small blonde child, hoisted her off the ground, and then darted away.

"I need to go," Wayne gagged, turning back towards the school building, mind racing with the possibilities.

"Daddy!" Marcy cried, clutching at her father. He was holding her under her arms about her torso. His grip was tight, and something had clearly spooked him. "Daddy, what are you doing? Where are we going?" she cried.

"No time!" he answered, throwing open the door to their car and sliding quickly into the seat. He didn't release her or place her into the seat beside him. He jammed the key into the ignition and turned it, and closed the door at the same time he shifted the car out of park.

"Daddy!" she cried as he hit the accelerator and their car went screaming out of the parking lot.

Marcy's eyes widened. She clutched against her father as their car went sliding chaotically out into the street, wheels squealing and rubber smoking. A car swerved out of their way, honking loudly. Her father shifted gears and they shot down the road.

"Daddy!" she cried. "Daddy, you're scaring me!"

Usually, such a plea would have snapped her eccentric father out of his mood. This time, he temporarily released the stick shift, and pressed her tightly to his chest. "Don't let go of me," he told her. "We need to _run_."

"Why?" she begged.

"We don't have much time, we have to get back and away before we're caught."

"Caught? Who wants to catch us? Daddy!" They passed a car in driving on the center line of the road, and merged back just before a semi truck smashed them into pieces. Marcy hadn't known that cars could travel so fast. Confused, frustrated, and frightened tears splattered over her cheeks. "Daddy!"

"Hush for me Buttercup," he implored her, squeezing her and then grabbing again for the stick shift. She shuddered, smothering her face into his shirt, afraid of why he'd used that appellation, and afraid because it didn't seem she could call him back from wherever it was he'd gone to.

It seemed to her that they were jumping out of the car before the vehicle had even come to a complete and final stop. Her father threw open the warehouse door and stepped in, slamming it closed behind him. He set her down and turned to lock the heavy metal frame shut.

"We have to move again, don't we?" she asked sadly.

He nodded sharply. "Run to your room and gather up your favorite things as fast as you can. Don't be any longer than a minute."

"What about Nibbles?" she asked.

"Go, Buttercup!"

She winced but nodded and turned, fleeing towards her room. Mr. Adams turned from the door and quickly flew across the kitchen, throwing open every cupboard and pulling out the quickest and most accessible snacks he could find. He raided the medicine cabinet for multivitamins and pills, grabbed a first aid kit, and stuffed all of these things into plain plastic bags.

_Why did I come back here?_ his mind snarled as he gathered up a few other effects, and stuffed a leather box into his coat. _He'll have records from the school. This place is a target. I should have left town immediately!_

He looked to the side, and his eyes alighted on Nibbles' enclosure. The rabbit was sitting up with its long ears perked up curiously, nose twitching. A burst of memory shot through his brain, like lightning stretching back from his forehead. He recalled Marcy's face, how she held the bunny close to her and nuzzled against its cheek. She had laughed.

Without even realizing it, he had drawn a knife. He was holding it with his elbow cocked backwards before his thinking mind came to, and he sucked in a surprised breath. Nibbles went very still, beady eyes staring at him, as if sensing danger.

Marcy's father shuddered. His face contorted in pain. He snickered gently, laughed, and then covered his mouth. His shoulders quivered violently with barely-repressed laughs. His green eyes closed in mirth, in irony, in delight, in fury, and then opened again. He looked to Marcy's room. What passed through his mind in that moment was grotesque, bloody, horrific. The temptation roared in his veins. The constant decision begged to be made differently, to be made in a way truthful to his nature.

He felt Marcy's _reflections_ then, as he always felt them. He saw what he would do, what it was his nature to do. He saw the end result of his beautiful maelstrom, spelled out before him in intricate, delicious detail. He lived in a world where the _choice_ needed to be made, at every moment, with every breath, because the decision he made was to postpone submission. He saw what he would do to her, in his most effortless and glorious moment of chaos.

Except that chaos could not, should not, refused to be _foreseen_. So what he saw in those reflections could not truly be chaos. Chaos was choosing against chaos. Chaos was internal. Chaos was within a soul. Chaos was self defiance. Chaos was not submission, not even to random impulse. It had to be _chosen_.

He had chosen _her_.

He screamed. The constant decision had become painful, almost unbearable. He crumpled to his knees and hugged himself helplessly. He couldn't move until he felt Marcy's hands on his face, wiping away his tears. Then he was overwhelmed as if by a mudslide, his internal fire both buried and quenched. The decision faded to a mindless whisper. With each second that passed, the choosing was easier. The alternative was easier to ignore.

Marcy's father could not think in that moment. He threw his arms around her, hoarding her to himself and nuzzling his forehead and cheek against her own. She wrapped her little arms around his neck and kissed the side of his face. He breathed in deeply several times. There was no law, there was no chaos. No wars, no struggles, no greater truth, no greater lies. There was only Marcy Adams, his daughter, his. He took in a deep breath and then pulled back from the embrace.

"Do you have everything?" he asked her.

She nodded.

He gave her shoulder a squeeze and then quickly moved to extract Nibbles from his cage. The bunny only put up a minor fuss as Mr. Adams placed the animal in their pet carrier. Then Marcy's father wrapped the grocery bags he'd stuffed with their provisions around one of his arms, and grabbed Nibbles' cat carrier with that hand. He reached out to Marcy, and then pulled her gently towards the escape hatch.

"Daddy?" she plead as he lowered her own into the secret passage way. "Who's after us?"

"At the moment?" her father asked, thoughtfully. He glanced backwards at the rest of the warehouse, and at the roof in particular. "A flying rodent," he answered as he climbed down after her. He pulled the trap door shut behind them just as a black form exploded through the warehouse's windowpanes.


	7. Chapter 7

*Pulls out Defibrillators*  
>Everyone, Pray.<p>

Veronica Peterson was six years old, and first grade was turning out to be difficult. Her teacher was nice. As usual, her 'ability' permitted her to traverse social obstacles with exceptional grace. Still, she had jumped so rapidly from school district to school district, elementary school to elementary school, and kindergarten to kindergarten, that some of her basic foundation skills were sub par. When she brought home her first poor grade on a homework assignment, her father took an interest. Mr. Peterson had realized the disservices he'd done in moving her around so much, and had promptly set to tutoring her.

"That's good," he encouraged. "V-e-r... now do the 'o'..." Veronica concentrated hard on her lined paper, on which she had been practicing her letters. She carefully sketched out the n-i-c-a that concluded her name, and earned a loving squeeze from her single parent. He paid close attention to her reading, writing, and numbers, but he also made sure to tutor her in disciplines like history. The two of them would read her school books together.

One thing Veronica liked about the current state of affairs was that her father would take her out camping in the state metro-parks on the weekends. There, he would tutor her in science and phys. ed. He brought her to see caves, canoe in rivers, catch frogs, play jump rope, ride bicycles, hopscotch, collect leaves, watch birds, and enjoy the flowers. Veronica had always been close with her father, but adding these delightful activities into the mix only made everything more wonderful.

For the first time since Marcy Adams, Veronica Peterson's life felt like it was at peace. Her only regret was that, this time, her father didn't seem as interested in getting involved with the school. Perhaps he had invested too much of himself in the last educational institution, and couldn't bring himself to conjure a repeat performance. Instead, he occasionally showed up near the school to keep an eye on her, particularly during recess and gym.

Veronica never liked it when her father came. He watched her with dark eyes, neither smiling nor waving. If she smiled or waved at him, he would usually duck out of sight. She knew the other kids found him creepy. The whole experience unsettled her. She had asked her father about this habit one evening, but he had cleverly steered her out of the subject over and over again.

She didn't like it. She felt like someone other than her father came to watch her on those days. The school fences felt like prison walls, only she couldn't tell who they we trying to contain. It scared didn't tell him that. She was more afraid of what might happen if he didn't come.

The collaboration table was a neat invention. An enormous touch pad of sorts, it was designed for the meeting rooms of large, paperless, corporate enterprises. Fifty pairs of hands- or more, depending on the size- could engage with the surface all at once, whether to call up digital documents from the cloud, or collaborate on a large 3D projections. A well-designed table had no set 'sweet spot' meaning that the surface appeared three dimensional no matter where a person was sitting or standing.

Mr. Wayne's had cost him a pretty penny. It was larger than his grand dining room table, and had more computational power than some ISPs.

He didn't really need the collaboration aspect of it, because fewer than ﬁve people had ever touched it. And sometimes the 3D illusion was a bit of a distraction- especially to a man who was so good at detecting illusions and seeing through them. No, the real reason for owning the table was that he could splay out the whole of the digital domain on a physical surface, draw relationships between it's elements, and manipulate the documents by hand. That table was for one man and one man only ( well, okay, Fox used it, too ), and he had used up every last remaining inch of it.

Bruce stormed around the table, throwing documents violently back and forward, drawing relationships and then striking them from existence, pulling up ﬁles and websites and documents only to smack his hands frustrated down against the glass a moment later. He needed a clue. His mind dove backwards into the last year, to memories he had already scoured religiously for hide or hair of his quarry. Then his memories moved back farther still, to older and more violent times.

"You're making yourself sick over this," Alfred protested softly. His mind still in the past, Bruce found himself wondering if the old butler had aged at all, or if the man were simply immortal. He had been old when Bruce was a child, and he seemed precisely the same as ever now. "Master Wayne," he plead.

"It's here, I know it is," Bruce told him. "I'm just not looking for it right, but it's here."

"What, sir?"

Bruce said nothing.

"A clue on where to ﬁnd your long dead nemesis?"

"I know what I saw, Alfred. And everything since has proved me right."

Alfred frowned, taken aback at this stretch of the truth. "That unfortunate character perished ﬁve years ago, sir. You watched it with your own eyes, you did."

"I'd watched him 'die' many times before that, only for him to show up again soon afterward."

"For God's sake, Bruce. He was buried. You and Commissioner Gordon had the body tested, and the DNA matched perfectly! And you believe that a couple of-"

"It was just another trick!" the bat disagreed with a raised voice. "One of millions, and no stranger than any!"

Alfred was silent a very long moment. After a moment, Bruce ﬂinched inwardly. He realized he sounded possessed, irrational. But that face had been unmistakable. Alfred had put up with worse obsessions before, and he'd put up with this one.

"I see, sir," said Alfred at last, his tone making it very clear that he disapproved. Then, surprisingly, he did not leave. "Do you remember the movie, 'A Beautiful Mind,' sir?"

Bruce lifted a brow. He glanced at Alfred, slightly amused. "Ready to turn me in to the men in white coats, Alfred?" he asked with a wry smirk.

"Here you stand with newspapers plastered over your table tops and walls, drawing lines between every missing child case in the country, circling phrases in articles as 'clues,' chasing blind correlations through countless unrelated bank accounts..."

"The Joker was one of the most dangerous and destructive arch villains I ever faced. He is a danger to everything that lives. It is my duty to follow any lead I ﬁnd, to put a stop to him."

"... And yet your foundation claim for this wild goose chase, sir," the butler continued, and it seemed as if he was holding back tears of frustration and concern, "is that your infamously destructive Joker... Has lived out the last ﬁve years quietly and harmlessly... Posing as an average man, a father, and a fervent contributor to the Parent-Teacher Association."

Bruce held Alfred's distressed stare for a very long moment. For the ﬁrst time in half a year, he let the full insanity of his claim sink into him, down to his bones. Then he nodded at the old butler.

"Alfred, I'm not doing this because the story sounds plausible," he said as evenly as he could. "If I was, I would have killed myself following a thousand leads that came out right after his death."

He leaned back from the table.

"I'm doing this because I made eye contact with my mirrored opposite, and we knew each other instantaneously. There was no doubt. There wasn't a moment's uncertainty. I saw him there that day, and he ﬂed with a little girl."

"But-"

"If he didn't recognize me, why did he run, Alfred? And why did his 'house' have an escape tunnel into the sewers? The Joker is the only one of them who ever found out who I actually am. It was him."

Alfred looked at him, standing there still so strong and young, so sure of himself, but possessed of such a terrible dark ﬂame. He let out a resigned sigh. "Very well, Master Wayne. But perhaps if your 'Mr. Adams' is going to continue behaving so contrary to his nature, you might try and ascribe a motive to him."

Wayne looked back to the table. "I'll ask him when I ﬁnd him. Most likely it's all illusory."

"Not what I meant, sir. You are looking for an effect in those papers, but you haven't guessed at a cause."

"All I know is that he's held on to some money, and he stole a girl."

"That's not quite true, sir."

Bruce glanced back at him.

"You know he stole a girl he was sending to elementary school."

"I've already run ten thousand school picture databases against the girl's face. She isn't showing up."

"Sir, education here in America is mandatory. If a child goes missing from a school, now that's a big thing. It attracts attention. People put their faces on walls and milk cartons. If he runs away at the toss if a dime... but he doesn't want to leave behind a string of missing child claims... Then he has to call back and formally withdraw her after  
>he's resurfaced. It's not a lightning-fast process. Might even have to fax in some forms, sir."<p>

Bruce hesitated. He looked down at his table, eyes wide. How the devil had he missed that?

Well, Alfred was the only one of them who had raised a child.

He leapt back to the table with renewed vigor. He had to track down the Joker. Fast. And ﬁgure out what the hell was going on.


	8. Chapter 8

Bruce Wayne had felt the claws of helplessness many times in his life, some more recently than others. As a child he had certainly known those claws at the death of his parents. But even as a mulch-billionaire and armored bat-ninja, It was common for his night time occupation to throw him into very dangerous scenarios. Often he was able to save himself; at times, he relied on the ingenuity of those around him.

Yet at the same time, Bruce Wayne was not familiar with being thwarted by more mundane forms of helplessness. In most situations, his tab or even his name were enough to get him the mundane things he needed in life: equipment, service, a date, coffee, a change of TV station, a five star hotel, a fleet of color-coded Ferrari...

So his current predicament had left him in a baffled, confused temper. He was having trouble tracking a single five-year-old girl across the continental Untied States.

The bat had managed to keep a vague tab on her whereabouts since Alfred's first tracking tip. But each time he came close to pinpointing her, she suddenly vanished, and it was another flustering and irritable adventure to get a lead on her again. And as for the man Bruce was following her for? Nothing. He hadn't shown up on the radar. Wayne just needed to hope that his old nemesis still had her; but he was not particularly fond of relying on lady luck for matters such as these. It was driving him mad. He hadn't slept or eaten properly in months. The problem was probably giving him gray hairs, but he hadn't looked at his reflection recently. He hadn't-

"Looking a little rough around the edges old man."

Bruce grit his teeth as the cocksure voice grated on his nerves. He turned around to glare at his protege- for lack of a better word, as 'partner' surely didn't work. The younger man was dressed in full costume, arms crossed over his chest and a slight smirk on his face. Interesting. Had he found something?

Bruce swallowed back his anger and responded with a curt and business-like, "Robin."

"Bats," the boy responded tartly.

Bruce scowled. "What, if anything, do you have to say?"

"Found him."

The vigilante knight stepped forward, grasping a railing tightly and leaning over it to peer at the younger man intently. _"Where_?"

"Hold up, Bats. Don't think it's who you're looking for. Arkham inmates don't suddenly settle down to raise babies. You can't just barge in and-"

"I am capable of ascertaining that for myself. I am not about to mistakenly drop in on an innocent single father and put a throwing knife in his skull," the older man responded furiously. "I am on the trail of a mass-murdering criminal; I have not suddenly turned into a lunatic!"

The younger man sat back on his heels, pursing his lips. "Alfred might beg to differ."

Bruce laughed darkly. "Alfred wishes many things about my life were different. He would very much like, for instance, that I settle down with a random woman and produce offspring. But that is not your concern. Robin. _Where is he_?"

His protege considered the question for a moment, and the expression on Batman's face, before at last pulling out a data stick, sauntering up, and tossing it to the older man. "Everything you need to know. Don't make me regret it, old man."

Bruce looked down at the data stick a moment before clasping it tightly and looking to Robin. "Does _she_ know?"

"Pfft," Robin made a sound of annoyance. "She was in Florida the whole time, running errands you sent her on. Or have you forgotten?"

"That woman has more ears than two, kid," the bat growled back. "_Does she know_?"

"No! I was careful. You're letting this _really_ get to you, old man. Don't appreciate being called 'kid'. "

Bruce took in a measured breath, particularly since his protege had just called him 'old man'. "Keep her busy, Robin. She can't find out what I'm working on. Not yet."

"Whatever. Takes more than a crazy girl in a clown outfit to get past me."

The bat pressed his lips into a grim line and stared directly at the younger man. "You are going to regret those words," he noted, "as am I." Then he turned back towards his computer with the data stick in hand. Robin made a face at his back.

* * *

><p>Veronica Peterson was learning about empathy. During lunch recess, another student had accidentally kicked a ball near where several other children were playing. Due to her ability, Veronica had been able to side-step the projectile. The ball had bounced past Veronica and collided with a second girl, who had been knocked to the pavement and had her knees badly scraped up.<p>

This had been quite a crisis for Veronic Peterson.

For you see, Veronica had knowingly moved _out of the _way of the ball. This meant (at least in Veronica's head) it was _her fault_ the other girl had been hit. Looking back, Veronica realized she had never been in any danger of being knocked to the pavement. The kickball would have been somewhat uncomfortable and perhaps left a bruise, but surely no skin would have been broken. And worse, Veronica had also known- due to her ability- that sidestepping would cause the other girl to be hit and knocked down.

In a way, she had caused the other girl to be injured. She could have blocked the blow and protected her classmate. Instead she now watched as the other girl screamed and wailed for her mother, clutching her bloody knees.

But surely this could not all be laid to rest on Veronica's shoulders? After all, she had not kicked the ball, and it was quite natural to avoid getting hit. The other girl should have dodged, as well. It was not Veronica's fault, and it was not her responsibility to- But couldn't she have tried to _catch_ the ball instead?

Veronica's face bunched up into a sad and upset expression, and before she knew it she was crying too.

* * *

><p>Apparently there actually <em>was<em> one thing that could bring Mr. Peterson back into an elementary school. Though, if he'd been able to, he might have spontaneously transformed into Darth Vadar and force-choked the school secretary to death over the phone. What did she _mean_, Veronica was in the nurse's office? How was that possible? Was she hurt? How could they let this happen? What had they done? Who had harmed her?

Ordinarily a calm and careful driver, Mr. Peterson had flown down the city streets at grossly inadvisable speeds, cutting off slow and speedy drivers alike, and at one point driving on the wrong side of the road. He was at the school within five minutes of the call, half-sprinting and half-stomping his way into the nurse's outfit as duel emotions of terror and fury coursed through him. The secretary tried to call out to him. He was simultaneously glad and bitter that she didn't approach him, as he surely would have put her head through a wall.

_Where is she?! Where is-!?_

As he rounded the corner into the nurse's room, his daughter's tearstained face looked up to him. She and her new friend (Suzanne, the girl who had scraped her knees) were sitting side by side licking lolly pops. Veronica was completely unharmed as the secretary had promised. Mr. Peterson didn't care that the other girl had scraped knees.

"_Buttercup_!" he gasped, eyes widening from slits into a round and helpless shape.

Veronica looked up with a slight gape. Then she gasped 'Daddy!' and hopped off of the bed, rushing into her father's crushing hug. He lifted her off the ground and held her tightly to his shoulder.

"Daddy! I'm okay!" she promised him, feeling his terrified agony through the lines of his coat, in the way he trembled.

"You're not hurt?" he whispered back.

"Like I was saying, Mr. Peterson," the secretary said behind them. "Veronica is quite alright. We just have a policy of informing parents any time students come to the nursing room, whether its for scrapes, a simple lice examination, or just some emotional distress."

Rage. Mr. Peterson whirled towards the woman. Veronica sensed the change and yanked sharply on his hair. He winced, blinked several times, and then looked to his daughter. Veronica shook her head solemnly. He grimaced and pressed his forehead into her.

No more school, he wanted to announce. He'd school her himself. He'd take care of her himself. But he couldn't say it aloud, not with the teacher in hearing distance. He didn't want to cause a fuss. He needed to escape quietly.

Please, he wanted to beg his daughter. Please no more school. Please, let me just take you home.

"I'm okay Daddy," Veronica told him. "I met a new friend! And I'm not hurt at all. I was just sad cause... cause I thought maybe I should have been able to catch the ball. Then Suzanne wouldn't have gotten hurt. Daddy? Daddy?"

Mr. Peterson looked up slowly from his daughter's frilly blouse. The secretary, slightly estranged, nevertheless imagined that Mr. Peterson had suffered some great trauma in the past. Perhaps concerning Veronica's mother. That might explain why he had overreacted so badly concerning Veronica. She'd need to make a note of this.

Would it be possible to send Veronica to talk to the school counselor? Was everything alright in her home life? It certainly didn't seem like the man was abusive, so perhaps it would be better if they merely scheduled a parent-teacher conference and had a heart-to-heart with him. Then they could help him alleviate his fears and do whatever was necessary to ensure he knew Veronica was well cared for at the school.

"Daddy?" Veronica asked, concerned.

"You're okay?" he asked her quietly.

She nodded enthusiastically "Please meet my new friend Suzanne!" she pointed behind her and turned around a little in her father's hold. "Suzanne got hit by a ball, I thought maybe I should have been able to catch it and she was crying a lot and I felt bad..."

Her father blinked at her, baffled. As she squirmed to get down he was obliged to let her, but then he followed quickly as she skipped up to the injured girl. "Suzanne!" Veronica announced delightedly, "this is my daddy! Daddy, this is Suzanne."

The other little girl smiled shyly, looking up at the slightly intimidating looking man with his acid-green eyes and unruly hair. "Hello."

Mr. Peterson looked back at her in disoriented confusion for a moment, clutching his daughter's shoulder protectively as if giant cockroach monsters could leap out at any time and try to consume her. Veronica made a prompting noise at him and gently tugged on his hand. "Daddy?" she asked softly.

Her father gave her a long, quiet, distant, and needing look. His eyes fluttered shut for a moment. When they opened again, he was the father Marcy Adams remembered. He smiled down at Suzanne Bigley for a moment and then knelt.

"Those are quite the scrapes you have there," he noted about her knees. "You're going to look like a well-traveled adventurer with bandages like those."

Suzanne blinked and blushed happily. "They hurt a lot at first and they still sting, but Veronica made me feel better. She walked me all the way to the nurse's office! And she talked to me when they were putting on the band aids."

"Is that so?" Mr. Peterson queried, looking up at his daughter. "That's mighty responsible of you," he praised. Veronica beamed, delighted at the sudden change. It was like something in her father had come back to life. This wasn't just another mask... He was putting aside whatever ugly sick thing had kept him running for over a year. She nodded enthusiastically.

"Daddy, Suzanne's birthday is next week and-"

"Can Veronica comeee?" Suzanne interrupted eagerly. "Pleeeaaaassse? It is going to be a party at my house. I'm sure my parents will say yes!"

"Wellll," Mr. Peterson considered, and considered also that he'd most likely be able to accompany his daughter and help out with the party if he so chose.

"Veronica?" came a voice like soft honey. Mr. Peterson froze, all paternal gentleness gone. He lifted his head and looked up with wolf eyes at the nurse who stood in the office doorway.

Nurse Quinn smiled smugly, joyfully, even ecstatically at him.

"I _knew_ it," she cooed rapturously.

Mr. Peterson stared back at her blankly, eyes dark, for several long moments. When he spoke again, his voice was melodious and polite. "Well," he noted as he stood up, "I'll have to consider the birthday party miss Suzanne. I've decided to take Veronica out of school for the rest of the day. I'm concerned this might have been a little too much excitement for her."

The secretary standing behind him blinked. "That's hardly necessary, I'm sure," she observed. "School's only an hour longer and Veronica's unharmed, I don't see any reason why she can't go back to class."

"I understand your concerns," Mr. Peterson responded, his gaze never leaving the school nurse, "but as the parent I have an understanding of my own child that you do not. I will be taking her out of school. Please bring up the requisite form for me to sign," he responded neatly. The secretary blinked, but perhaps something in his voice triggered her innate survival instincts, because she backed up and went to do as she was instruction.

Harley smiled at him. Mr. Peterson fingered the shiv tucked into the back of his waistband, and held his daughter tight against his leg.'


	9. Chapter 9

Recall I have no interest in sticking to any particular canon. This interpretation of Harley has much more in common with older material than with her newer designs.

* * *

><p>When Harley entered the warehouse, she found him sitting alone on a crate. The masks and pretenses she'd seen when he'd visited the school were gone. He was wearing his true face, face of white greasepaint and tangled green hair, blackened eyes and his mouth now a chaotic seam of red. He was backed in his element, his body conveying complete and violent control; his clothing and hair disheveled, chaotic. His shirt sleeves were rolled up and his posture conveyed that he'd been waiting for her.<p>

Her eyes glittered with barely contained awe and adoration.

She had had something of a speech rehearsed in her head, a long list of fanciful ideas about what she'd say if, no, _when_ she had finally discovered the dead man still lived. Instead of delivering this well-rehearsed speech, what came out of her mouth was: "You're alive."

"Candid of you," he responded mockingly. "And _you_ soon won't be."

Harley pouted, tightened her arms around the middle of her leather trench coat. "Is _that_ any way to say hello after all this time? Everyone thought you were dead! You were _buried_!"

"That was, as you appear to misunderstand, the point," he noted. "To disappear."

"From them, yeah, but from _me?_" she protested. "I was your partner!"

"Oh from you _most_ of all," he answered, crossing his arms over his chest and smiling, a vicious expression on his face. "You were the hardest to shirk; worse even than the damn bat. 'Partner' wasn't exactly the word I'd use. Perhaps leech? Pawn? Expendable fanatic?"

Harley glowered. The rush of emotions she felt at that moment- relief, pain, love, agony, frustration, adoration, admiration, stress, disbelief, resignation, and hurt- barreled through her in a blurred rush. She didn't know what to think or say; she was feeling too many things to enumerate them all.

"Oh, what's wrong, Harleen?" he drawled, lazily drawing himself up to a standing position. "Usually you're _so_ chipper."

Harley closed her eyes. She had never changed her name back; she'd taken the old call-sign as her own. Even after all these years, even after- She took in a long, slow breath. When she opened her eyes, she found him just a foot away from her. He towered over her still, but the look on his face was suddenly curious.

Perhaps nothing at that moment surprised him more than the fact that she suddenly backhanded him. He was so shocked, in fact, that he stumbled backwards a step and grabbed at his face. He looked at his hand, and then back to her, and then tilted his head to the side in puzzlement.

It was no secret that he had used Harleen from the moment he'd first met the good doctors. He knew it, Bats knew it, and odds were Harley deep down knew it too. He'd purposely twisted her from a good-hearted doctor into a psychotic anarchist. Sure he liked what she symbolized: degeneration of innocence. Sure he knew she was loyal and useful. But for him, these sorts of things translated neither to affection nor attachment. In fact it was likely the Joker would have been more willing to sacrifice Harley than to kill Batman; at least the latter still posed a challenge.

Harley was easy. She was infatuated, she was malleable, and it was not within her power to hate him. He could drop her off a bridge a thousand times, and she'd walk right into letting him drop her off one all over again.

So thinking back, he was rather certain that he'd thrown Harley into harm's way plenty of times (and always made up for it by fawning over her when he'd needed her help again), but she had actually never hit him back before.

"You _bastard_," Harley snapped. "I never stopped believing you were alive! I cried at your 'funeral' but I never stopped looking! I knew you were alive and I never gave up on you!"

"That's about to turn out unfortunately for you," he observed, drawing his shiv out from the waistband of his pants and flicking it between all five fingers of his left hand.

Harley narrowed her eyes at him, which was quite different from her usual pout. Her fists balled up tightly at her sides. He watched her with perplexed amusement, noting the new body language that had worked its way into her character. A few years had certainly done much to miss, "Harley Quinn," though he didn't imagine it was more than skin deep.

"You abandoned me!" she burst out. "What was I supposed to do without you!? I would have followed you to the end of the earth! I've nearly died to save you a hundred times! Why didn't you tell me you were alive!? Why couldn't I know?"

He lifted his brows. "Pretty girl, whatever made you believe I gave a rat's _ass_ about what happened to _you_?" He advanced on her. "You're broken, Harleen Quinzel. You live in a fantasy world. It let me use you like a loyal dog for a decade; and now it's going to take you to your end this very evening."

His words seemed to have an effect on her because her jaws clenched and the skin around her eyes tightened like she was in pain. "You'd really kill me?" she asked him. "Just for finding you? You wouldn't. You never have. There's no game in it. And we are _partners_."

No game in it? It wasn't like Harley to think objectively, but her words stirred a sleeping part of himself, a powerful part of himself, a part that threw laughter out from between his lips before he'd even registered its awakening. Images flashed through his mind. He felt his daughter's reflections like shock of lighting.

"No _game_?!" he wheezed, laughing hard and manic. "No game!" He whirled about, throwing his arms to gesture to the warehouse he'd hidden in several miles out of New York city. "No game!" he called delightedly to it. An echo reverberated back as he eyes locked on the adjacent room where he'd hidden his most precious possession. The reflections beat out of that room like waves, allowing him to experience a thousand alternate scenarios, a thousand alternate bloodbaths, a broad prediction of who and what he was, a statement of what he was capable of and what his limitations were.

Except currently he was defying them _all_.

"No game, indeed," he whispered to himself, licking imaginary blood from his shiv. He turned a maddened gaze on Harley and grinned broadly. "Harleyyy... Sweet, pretty, daaaannnncing haaaarlequinnnnn..." he cooed to her. "Before I kill you, tell me this: What _did_ happen to you, Harley-Girl? Been clowning around in Gotham without me? Or have you hitched yourself to some other star? Ivy? You never did like being _alone_... But who else, I wonder, would _want_ you? Who is going to cry when _you_ don't come home tonight?"

Her fists clenched and he grinned.

"What costume are you hiding from me under that coat, dear Harley? Who has the _honor_ of your allegiance?"

Harley lifted her chin and gave him a long and angry look tempered at the edges with loss and sorrow. He tapped gently over his knife. She snorted. "What did they do to you in those last days?" she asked. "What _is_ this you're doing here...? What's- what's that... that _kid_ to you?"

"I'm _waaaaiiiting, _Preeetttyy giiiirlll..." he drawled impatiently taking a step towards her and easing another knife free from his person.

Harley scowled.

He grinned, made as if to turn, and then with a subtle flick she had never been good enough to register he sent a knife flying her way. Its tip sunk into her coat and she gave a small exclamation of surprise. The look of shock on her face had everything to do with betrayal and nothing to do with pain. He laughed.

"Show me," he cooed at her. "Show me your stripes, won't you?"

"I don't have to listen to you!" she snarled, grabbing for a pistol holstered at her side. "I don't have to listen to what you say about me!" she pointed the gun at him, and he blinked in pleased surprise. "I know what you are, I know what you've done to me, I'm not some dog! I know _exactly _what I'm worth, and I _love_ you anyway!

"Well _that's _a funny way of showing it," he laughed, peering between the folds of her trench coat. A new costume was just visible, and on the chest a broad copper oval frame the black silhouette of a very familiar animal. "So Harley Quinnnnn... That's the name, now? And the call sign is...?"

"Fruit Bat," she cooed back, her saccharine violence matching his own. "And it's sure the better job, boyo."

"I'm not going to fault you on your choice in employer, Harley-Girl. I'll grant you that you picked something _safe_, something _secure_, someone who at least won't _intentionally_ leave you to die. Look at that fancy armor... probably worth a million in cash, ain't it? If the bat could be said to have only one soft point, its his belief in redemption."

Harley pursed her lips together, not sure if she ought to be offended, and also uncertain what he was getting at.

"In fact, the thing that will kill you tonight is forgetting how great you've got it working for him, giving into the temptation of chaos, and tracking down _me_. You were always very self-destructive, you know."

"That's _not fair_!" she told him. "I was following _you!_"

"And look it where it's led you," he rumbled, stepping towards her and reaching down perhaps to draw another knife.

"I have a gun," she warned him fairly, and she was relieved her voice didn't tremble. She'd smacked him once already, and she wasn't such a lovesick songbird that she couldn't pull the trigger if he'd forgotten... If it was really and irrevocably true that she had never meant _anything_ to him.

At the threat of the gun he gave her a flat look and raised an eyebrow. "You've got something on your shirt, sugar plum," he noted, pulling out a small device like a lighter and flicking open the head. Harley momentarily looked down, to the shiv with its tip still embedded in the outer material of her armor.

Too late, she noticed it had an explosive head.

* * *

><p>In her room, Veronica heard the opening explosion. There were tears running down her face and her cheeks were red and puffy. She had Mr. Nibbles in both arms and was petting him reassuringly. He was startled at the loud noise. Veronica gave a sob and lifted him up to her face, burying herself in his soft and fluffy coat.<p>

_Daddy..._

_Come back..._

_Please come back..._

_I didn't cry the nights you left, but I saw them. _

_I know bad things happened. I know you went to protect me. I know sometimes you went to protect me from you._

_But I love you and I need you, and I never cried. Please come back. Please come back. Please come back! _

She heard gunshots and pops, crashes and explosions. A fight was going on outside; a fight like she'd seen in action movies and old westerns. Someone was going to get hurt. Someone was going to... Was it that nice nurse Quinn who was chasing them now? Was this all Veronica's fault? Were they after her Daddy or were they after Veronica? She'd seemed so nice.

Veronica heard a scream, shouting, yelling. Her bunny wriggled and then darted out of her arms and bounded into his cage. She gave a cry of alarm and reached out for him, but then just sat there with tears on her face when she realized he just wanted to feel safe. She could sympathize. _She_ wanted to feel safe.

She wanted to-

Another scream. Another explosion. A long and pregnant silence broken occasionally by shuffling noises and moving furniture Veronica couldn't take it. Too much had happened recently. She couldn't hide like her father had told her. She couldn't pretend not to _hear_ anymore. She needed something, just like Mr. Nibbles did. With her heart bursting out of her chest, she ran up to the doorway, threw open the lock, and bolted outside.

"DADDY!"


	10. Chapter 10

Miss Something? Several Chapter Updates In a Row, Maybe?

* * *

><p>Damn that girl! She was going to get herself killed! And damn Robin for being such a cocksure fool!<p>

The bat gauged the distance from himself to the Joker carefully- that green hair was unmistakable!-and knew he only had one shot to succeed. If he failed to time his attack perfectly, Harley was going to die. The Joker had her pinned on the floor with a shiv in her thigh and one of her arms wrenched under a heavy piece of furniture. He had both hands around her throat and there were only moments left to act. That said, the man also had access to a wide variety of throwing knives, and could snap his victim's neck in a heartbeat.

Now.

When Veronica Peterson saw her father strangling nurse Quinne to death, the day became far too much to bare. Her shrill "DADDY!" pierced through the warehouse, echoing off of every surface. It was alot louder in sound than she realized it could be. Her father reacted instantaneously to the sound of her; his whole body jerked violently and he whirled his head around to stare at her.

Standing there with tears streaming down her face, her eyes hot and heavy with the effects of saline, and her nose running, Veronica felt helpless to do anything. Her mind was blank of thoughts. All she wanted to do was cry, and all she felt was miserable. She lifted her arms in the air. She wanted her daddy.

The Joker did not move, his posture lupine, his acid eyes violent and calculating. He was dressed in his ghastly face paint, with its dead white skin and cave-like eyes. The red lips made it look like he'd drank someone's blood. He remained coiled over top his suffocating victim, fingers buried in the flesh of her neck, eyes lost in predatory bloodlust.

It was up into the face of this twisted monster that Veronica looked, sniffling and hiccuping, with such complete faith, trust, love, and dependency. He was daddy. Facepaint didn't matter. Evil didn't matter. Death didn't matter. He was the one and only human being in the world imbued with the mystic powers necessary to make the world okay again.

"Dad-d-da-dy!" she blubbered.

The Joker looked down at Harley Quinn one final time. Her face was losing its coloration and her eyes were starting to gloss over. The look she was giving him was somewhat similar to Veronica's own. A wave of violence washed over him. His fingers tightened momentarily as his daughter whimpered and hiccuped. He looked at Veronica, and some remote part of him suddenly recalled her pride in him. Her delight; the fact that she had _bragged_ about him to her friends.

That singular moment of sane fondness, that instant in which he found himself considering that killing a woman in front of his daughter was probably bad parenting, sent a wave of violent _need_ through him so powerful that it made his body shake, his fingers convulse, and pangs of anguish and delight flutter through his stomach. His hands wanted to move of their own accord, but it was not Harley Quinn they currently wanted to strangle.

Then after a moment his eyes closed tightly. He raised up one of his shivs. He brought the blunt end down on her temple. Veronica jumped at the violent impact. Without a second glance back at Harley, the Joker stood up, walked over to his daughter, knelt, and picked her up into his arms. He placed a hand on the back of her head so he could tuck her face into his shoulder instead of letting her look over it at his handiwork.

Veronica could scarcely breathe she was crying so much. Her father's overly tight hold was also distressing her "D-dad-d-sh-she-is-is sh-she-"

"Shh... She's just sleeping," the Joker promised. He buried his face deeply into Veronica Peterson's hair, drawing in everything, every tiny precious detail, of the thing to which he had arbitrarily committed the wholeness of his life. He had the urge to gut her, to smell the metallic heat of her spilled entrails, to watch horror and betrayal and desperate fear fill up her eyes... Worse he could _see_ himself doing all of those things and more, so that the line between reality and reflection was blurred and he could barely tell which reality he was currently standing in.

Then after a moment those thoughts were fragmented; burst asunder as he registered she smelled like peach shampoo. He had washed her hair with peach shampoo that very morning. He could remember that moment- only a few hours past- and the crisp clean aroma of soap and water as he'd sponged her tiny arms and legs and let her splash half a tub of water at him. He had even painted her fingernails.

The Joker looked down at his daughter's tiny fingertips where they clenched tightly against his dirty shirt. Each tail was coated in a fine layer of sparkly pink. He wondered at them, at their simplicity, at their small size, at their delicate appearance. Then his shoulders slumped, his fingers loosened, and he smothered his face into his child's hair again.

"It's okay," he murmured in his warm and rumbling bass. "Someone will come for her soon. We need to go."

Veronica nodded miserably into him, not protesting the way she had as Marcy Adams. "Da-ddy..." she mumbled unhappily. "Daddy..."

"I'm sorry," he whispered to her, bundling her to him before taking his first slow steps towards the exit. "I'm sorry. It will be okay."

She nodded. Her fingertips touched his face, pressing firmly against his skin to remind herself that he was there and everything was going to be okay. Her fingers came away white. The Joker paused, staring at the greasepaint caked around her little pink nails.

"Honey," he whimpered suddenly, remembering a Halloween one year past. His daughter had asked to dress up as Poison Ivy. Was it possible that she _knew_ now? Did she know what the makeup meant? The colors? Had she ever seen a picture of- of-...

There was movement. The Joker spun around, clutching Veronica tightly to him and drawing three knives out in his unoccupied hand without even thinking about the gesture. At first, it appeared there was no one else in the warehouse, but the lighting was currently poor and the Joker knew better. He watched the dark space directly above Harley's collapsed form. A moment later, the pregnant darkness suddenly unfolded, and a black silhouette dropped quietly down beside her.

Perhaps it was the _stillness_ that kept Joker from reacting. That is, the stillness of his nemesis, who didn't move except to place himself defensively in front of the fallen 'Fruit Bat.' A moment of freezing silence passed between the two men, each posed to attack if only the other should take hostile action first. Then the bat slowly took a knee and reached behind him to feel for Harley's pulse. The Joker backed up a hasty step. Batman did not pursue. The latter waited a moment to ensure that the pulse he felt was strong and stable.

"You are very close to home for a dead man on the run," he then finally observed.

The Joker said nothing, backing up another step and lifting the blades higher. Veronica, who until that moment had been oblivious to the appearance of a newcomer, nearly jumped out of her skin. She blinked sleepily and turned about in her father's hold, trying to get a look at the speaker. When she did, her jaw dropped a little.

"Are you alright, kid?" Batman asked her.

Veronica felt the violent surge before it surfaced. She spun back to her father and threw her arms around his neck, hugging him tightly. "Daddy!" The Joker stiffened, furious energy coagulating into something more complex, more verbal.

"Not yer business, Bats. Now take Sleeping Beauty here and skedaddle!" Veronica looked up at her father's face, with its terrifying makeup and dripping sneer. It was not the fac epaint that frightened her, but the high pitched whine she heard entering his voice.

The dark knight's eyes narrowed at the absurdity of that claim. "I'm pretty sure whatever Arkham's Joker does is my business." He stood up slowly.

"Daddy," Veronica plead softly. Acid green eyes flashed to her and rounded out some. When he looked back at the Batman, his voice had dropped back into its low bass octave.

"I think I deserve at least a _little_ credit for my good behavior, don't you think?" he growled with slight joviality. "I've been playin' it nice, Bats, but I don't wanna be found. Be grateful I didn't kill Harley and go. I'll slink back into a hole and you won't hear a peep from me."

Batman studied him silently for a long moment, his motions largely obscured by his black cloak. Then he said perhaps the worst thing possible: "That is not your daughter."

There was a long silence. No sudden change occurred in the Joker, although the little girl perked up in surprise and twisted about to stare at Batman. For a long moment, the violent man's acid green eyes just stared, and not a twitch marred his face. Then his eyelids suddenly fluttered. He took in a long breath and then turned to the side and slowly set Veronica down.

"Hey sweet pea, mind just staying right here for a second? Daddy needs to have a 'chat' with an old friend," he said. The little girl looked up at him with round eyes, and then vigorously shook her head. " 'atta girl, and cover your ears," he praised, ruffling her hair before turning away and sauntering up towards the Batman. Veronica sniffled and quickly pressed both of her palms over her ears, staring after her single parent.

"Hey. _You_. Come here," Joker hissed, walking up slightly tangent to the bat till he was within easy speaking distance, and making a 'come here,' gesture. Perplexed, but wary of trickery, Batman did not move. He watched the Joker suspiciously. The latter man sneered and then took a step closer.

"The _fuck_ is the matter with you?" he growled in a very low and hostile whisper. "You can't just walk around telling kids they're _adopted!"_


	11. Chapter 11

The Bat was somewhat taken aback by the sudden twist this conversation had taken. It was not precisely how he'd expected his first meeting with the 'dead' Joker after six years of silence.

"You can't just _do_ that!" the green-haired man was lecturing, his voice fluttering through its wide and expressive range of pitches and tones. "That's a private matter between parents and their kids! You can't just _say_ something like that Bats, that's a complete taboo, a huuugggeee no-no! I mean fuck you don't have be a childhood psychology expert to figure that one out! You don't even have to be that bright! When's the last time you watched a soap on TV?! You can't just _do_ that! Don't you ever get out of your little castle and look out at the world?"

The Batman studied him quietly, eyes narrowed, trying to decide what ulterior trick the man was trying to pull; but as usual, it was never clear where acting began and seriousness ended with the Joker. Ordinarily he would have interpreted this as a manic outburst covering up some attempt to get near a bomb, tripwire, lever, or other situational advantage, but that didn't seem to be the Joker's intent; the man was currently almost pacing.

"What the hell am I supposed to tell her now!? What do I do when she asks me what happened to her parents, or why they gave her up, or whether or not they loved her!? She's six years old! What am I supposed to say? 'No, honey, don't worry, the nice lady and man who made you loved you very much, its just that daddy wasn't that nice of a person back then. He and his friends killed your old mommy and daddy and... well... oops? Fuck you! I was expecting another ten years to figure this out!"

It wasn't like the Joker to rant or speak at length unless he was trying to stall for something or manipulate a reaction. The Batman didn't fall for it, studying him closely and pulling apart his words. Seeing that the Bat was paying more attention to the Joker's shiv's and environmental hazards than to what he was saying apparently had a sobering effect on the other man, who, rather than pouting, suddenly clenched his fists and took an aggressive step in his adversary's direction.

"Hey!" he growled in a low bass octave, a pitch which Batman had rarely heard before and which throughout this experience he had now heard multiple times. "I am _talking_ to you," he uttered dangerously. "The _hell_ am I supposed to tell her now, huh?"

"You've just highlighted exactly why you have no claim to this child," Bruce responded.

"Ho-ho, wrong on that count," Joker exclaimed, rocking back on the balls of his feet and sneering up at the bat's face victoriously. "She's one hundred percent mine. I did it all the 'legal' way, just to iron out any unforeseen problems."

"Then you supplied fallacious or incomplete information," the Bat noted dismissively. "You have just admitted to the murder of her parents, and you have a long history of murder and mental instability. You will be coming back to Arkham. There is no child services or legal professional who would permit you to keep a child."

The Joker's eyes narrowed at the implied, 'and neither will I.' But his voice did not lift from its low pitch. "You're talkin' bold for a man in your position, you know. The Inquirer just featured a small article where eyewitnesses saw your butler toting around a child carrier. Did an old friend leave a kitten on your pillow in the night some time recently?"

_That_ got the other man's attention. Everything about the Bat's posture made a subtle change, and he knew the vigilante had just readied a smoke bomb or other weapon behind his cape. Quite suddenly, the Joker realized just how far behind him his daughter was. The Bat had a clear line of vision to her. Joker flicked a shiv out from his waistband.

"If you _touch_ her..." he warned with all the violent and acrid hatred of a rabid dog.

There was a moment of silence as both men realized they had spoken the same words, simultaneously, in the same exact voice.

Then each sized the other up. A long and hostile quite passed between them. The little girl standing some distance from them slowly uncovered her ears, looking up in wonder at them both. After a long moment, she tottered forward uncertainly. The Joker flinched when he sensed the motion and looked worriedly back at her. "Kiddo!" he warned, gesturing that she should get behind him.

Batman frowned, looking at the child. "Are you alright?" he asked her.

Veronica paused, confused by the question and the fear she saw in her father's eyes. She hesitated a moment before mumbling a confused, "What?"

Batman glanced at the Joker. "Has he hurt you?"

Veronica's eyes widened. "No!" she exclaimed, horrified. Joker's fists clenched and he turned a vicious gaze towards him, acid eyes narrowing to slits.

"Has he asked you to do anything bad for him?"

"No! No, Daddy never hurts me, ever!" she exclaimed, tears threatening at the corners of her eyes. "He teaches me and makes lunch and is the best daddy ever!"

"Bats, leave my kid _alone," _Joker growled. "If you tracked me down all this way to slap me in irons then you deal with _me,_ not her!"_  
><em>

"She is not-" There was a moment of intense and violent tension, every fiber of the Joker's tensed body _daring_ him to utter those unforgivable words again. For a long sixty seconds, there was silence between them as each contemplated what to do. Veronica, abruptly, broke the still.

"Are you Batman?"

Both men turned to see the little girl had come up closer to them. She was hovering very close to her father's leg, but was out in the open enough that she could look up at the black-garbed vigilante and get a good look at him in the warehouse lighting. She didn't seem close to crying anymore, although now and then she looked down at nurse Quinn to reassure herself the woman was still breathing. The Joker and the Bat both seemed surprised by the sudden interruption, but after a moment, the latter nodded.

"Can I have your autograph?"

The Joker looked down at her in disbelief, eyes blinking wide in surprise. Batman blinked. A long and awkward pause seemed to hang in the air, as the six-year-old's baffling words completely altered the feel of the hostile meeting. A moment ago, the Batman had been assessing his adversary and probing baffled for information about what the arch-villain had been up to for the last six years. It wasn't beyond the Joker to spend a significant amount of time on building up an elegant scheme, though it was more typically his nature to play with ad hoc manipulations. But now with Veronica's innocent question, the world seemed to turn itself on its head. Quite suddenly _she_ was the center of the spectacle, not the Joker or the Bat.

Slowly, wary of the Joker, Batman eased aside his cape and revealed that he was holding one of his specialty cut throwing stars. He gave it a gentle toss to the ground at her feet. Delighted, Veronica pounced on the gift and picked it up, feeling over the shape with the care of a little girl whose father tended to leave one too many knives lying around the house, and who therefore knew to be careful with sharp objects.

She smiled up at the masked vigilante with childish awe. "I want to be a superhero too when I grow up!" she told him.

The Joker made a strangled noise in the back of his throat, and then jumped when his daughter looked up at him in confusion. Joker stood up straight, looked at the Bat, looked down at his daughter, looked out at the warehouse, and then slapped a hand over his face and broke out laughing. Veronica blinked in alarm at the reaction and quickly tugged on her father's shirt sleeve. The Bat blinked in surprise.

"Daddy? Daddy!" she pleaded for him to respond. The Joker continued to laugh for a moment, squeezing the bridge of his nose and thumbing gently through his daughter's hair to reassure her he hadn't just gone crazy. When he could talk again his eyes twinkled mischievously and he grinned down at her.

"I thought you wanted to be a princess, race car driver, and hockey player?"

"That will be my secret identity," she told him sagely.

"Uh huh," he continued, voice dripping into a harmless pout, "and what about _my_ autograph? Don't you want that?"

His child blinked at him in confusion, and then reached into her shirt pocket and drew out her lucky card. Aged and dog-eared at the corners, the card was unmistakably a joker. Her father winced initially at the sudden realization that his daughter did know, and _had_ guessed for quite some time exactly what he was. "Ah-" he managed. Then panic was replaced by warm paternal affection at her brilliance. He made a pleased hum in the back of his throat and pulled her tightly against him. "I see. Well then. She wants to be a superhero, Bats!"

"Joker," the Bat suddenly growled, drawing the green-haired man's attention back to the situation at hand. "What have you _don_e_?"_

"Something really random let me tell you," the archvillain joked. "I mean I thought some of my old stuff was pretty damn random, but this? Man this would blow _minds_. Shit's _hilarious_. Could you imagine the expressions I'd get? Look Bats I don't mean to cut this short- nice seein' ya and all- but it is _way_ past little Buttercup's bedtime. Imma have ta' let ya go."_  
><em>

The Bat took a step forward. "Do you know how many men and women are dead because of you?" he asked. "I came here to find where you were hiding, and to bring you back to Arkham so that no one else has to suffer because of you."

"So let me get this straight, after six years of me not bothering a soul, your plan is to 'stop' me from bothering souls by... lighting a fire in my house and flushing me out in the open?"

The Bat frowned. "Those people deserve justice. And to know that you're behind bars and in a strait jacket."

"That's a valid perspective," the Joker agreed. "Though I think 'deserve' is a strong word, maybe we should just say they 'want' it and you're willing to go out and nab it for them. Say Bats, what do you prefer: Justice for dead folk, or to keep living people alive?"

"You're not getting out of this by twisting words with me, Joker; I don't lose sleep wondering if you're right or wrong."

"Bats!" the green-haired man snapped, and then eyed his long-time adversary with disappointment and resignation. Bruce frowned, eyeing the clown uncertainly, before at last the other man explained himself. "I have a _kid_," the Joker intoned carefully, laying weight on the words. "I'm guessing you suddenly find yourself knowing what that's like?" He paused to study the other man's face before continuing. "Then you should_ get it_. Just leave me alone. I'll keep outta yer hair."


	12. Chapter 12

The masks always stayed on. Even as they kissed and tumbled, and clothing was shifted aside, the majority of each costume remained. It was odd. They both knew the other's name. But perhaps if they pretended, it was easier to keep each other safe that way. What they didn't know, they couldn't use against the other. They tried to minimize potential conflicts. Since the showdown six years ago, their love-hate dance had mellowed out into something warmer and more stable. They had an unspoken agreement. As long as she picked her targets carefully and focused on corrupt businessmen and mob lords, Batman turned a blind eye to her antics.

Shades of gray were a little difficult for Batman. His personal code helped him see the world in black and white, often a necessary polarization when lives of over a million persons were in his hands. Shades of gray tended to confuse things... but with Catwoman, they were something he had learned to live with. The two of them often fought, each arguing their definition of the word 'corrupt.' Was a man who lied on his tax returns corrupt? A billionaire who had been caught in a single fraud? But after all the arguing, they kept meeting. They kept arguing. They stopped trying to outwit one another. Their ideas started to converge on some kind of compromise.

They were informants to one another; they traded information on Gotham's inhabitants freely. When she was closing in on a mark, he'd know because she'd forward him a great deal of condemning information on a man. At first, those times had been very difficult; it was hard not to stop her. Usually he would go and watch from the shadows, and he always felt a great fear about what he would do if one day she messed up. If it were a mobster or villain she was robbing, he'd intervene to protect her. But a dishonest politician or factory owner? What if she resisted arrest? What if they called in _him_ to try and stop her?

The more they met, the more they argued, the more they needed one another, the less he knew what he'd do with himself if she suddenly threw morality to the winds and went on a nation-wide burgling spree. His head said that he'd do his duty and bring her to justice. But then his head was still confused about why every time he saw The Cat, it seemed to end up with him losing some important articles of clothing. And then again, he reasoned, she was already doing him a great service every time she walked away from a juicy target because she could find no validation for the crime.

Still the masks always stayed on. And the longer they kissed, the less his mind could wonder W_hy am I holding you? __Why am I doing this? Why do I bend for you? Why do I need you? _and the more he found his fingers roving hungrily over her flesh. When he felt her glove's sharp talons pierce his side, he didn't think much of it. She was often a little too rough. In answer he just grabbed her wrist gently but firmly, pulled it from his skin, and tugged off the glove. They intertwined, nibbled, groped, touched. But then he started feeling... dizzy. Lightheaded. He persisted in kissing her for a moment but then pulled back and looked confused into her eyes.

"What did you do?" he asked in a low voice. Not condemnatory, but extremely firm. She still winced, and a weight seemed to settle in on her, an age and weariness that she'd been repressing.

"It'll wear off in an hour," she promised him.

He frowned. "And where and in whose custody will I be waking up?"

"It's not like that," she hastily explained without explaining anything.

"_Selina_," he warned. He rarely ever used her name. At the sound of it, she winced again and then pushed towards him and wrapped her arms around his neck. He tried to stop her but nearly fell over. His mind was clouding fast. His arms gave out, but she held him up. When she didn't supply an answer, he grimaced and pressed his face into her shoulder. Then abruptly, and much to her surprise, he said, "I trust you." A pause. "You should try... trusting... _me_..."

She didn't get time to answer him before the sleeping poison took hold and knocked him unconscious.

When Bruce woke up, he was exactly where she'd left him. He was unharmed, and the articles of clothing he'd lost had been laid out neatly beside him. _What was the point of that? _He grimaced and tried to sit up, but there was a weight on his cape and against his back. It wasn't much, just a few pounds... But something instinctive told him to roll over and have a better look first. He did so hazily, shifting his weight onto his side and peering uncertainly at the weight. Then his eyes widened.

Wrapped in an old shirt with a letter beside her, and snuggled up against his back, a diminutive pink sausage was staring up at him with baffled blue eyes. Bruce stared. The baby stared back, mumbling a little.

_Oh. Oh no._

_Selina... What... what the hell...?_

The letter. He carefully moved about till he could partially sit up without touching the kid or sending it flying. Then with trembling hands, he reached over to pick up the letter. On it Selina has scrawled only a few words: "She's yours. I need you need to handle this. I can't. - Cat."

Though the letter was short and to the point, Batman stared at it for a very long moment. His 'daughter's' unhappy mumbling drew him out of his paralysis. With horrified fascination, he eased himself up to his hands and knees, and then pulled his cape and the child into his arms.

Babies were not supposed to be this small. This was _too_ small. Curled up, her little frame fit entirely within the cup of his hands. Uncertain what to do, he'd held her helplessly for a long moment before transferring her into just one arm, cape still supporting her like a hammock. With the other hand, he tried to examine her for injuries. She gummed at his gloved fingertips and wiggled a little. She _seemed_ okay... Weren't babies supposed to cry? She made an unhappy mewling noise and he pulled her instinctively close against his chest.

"Alfred..." he muttered, and then looked in the direction of home.

He needed help. Now.

* * *

><p>Bruce had gotten dressed sloppily and one-handed, before bolting back with his precious cargo. He was out in Gotham night air. He paged Alfred to be waiting for him, signaled it was an emergency, but did not place a call to tell the old man what he was bringing. He wasn't certain he could say it aloud.<p>

When Bruce entered the cave he found the butler already waiting for him, with Robin and Harley out on other tasks. The old man was of course quite worried; Bruce had sent him an 'emergency' ping after all.

"Bruce?" Alfred breathed, looking over the young man for wounds and then pausing when he realized the bat was carrying something. The look on the young Master Wayne's face was dumbstruck, somewhere between awe and horror. "What's wrong, Bruce?"

For a long moment the Bat could not respond, just looking quietly down at the bundle in his arms. Then he hesitantly turned and adjusted his cape so that Alfred could see. "Selina," he murmured helplessly. The butler's eyes flew open wide and he stood so straight that for a moment Bruce wondered if he would fall over backwards and faint dead away. Then he seemed to snap to life again and strode quickly forward, disentangling the tiny child from the masked vigilante's cape.

"So tiny," Alfred mumbled worriedly. "I'm calling the family doctor, he'll be discrete as always. Get dressed quickly now." Alfred paused, and then his voice leveled out as he noticed the younger man hadn't taken his eyes off the little girl. "Don't worry, Bruce. I've got her."

Bruce nodded and quickly stripped out of his armor. He had fresh clothing on in record time, and was pacing nervously as Alfred made a temporary diaper and then tucked the little one into some clean towels in a spare decorative basket. Robin arrived home first, as he had been alerted by Alfred that their might be an emergency, and no one had remembered to contact him again later. At first he tried to get answers from Alfred, who shooed him and told him to go get work done in the cave or something. Then he noticed how Bruce was staring at the basket like a dingo. He put two and two together and then quietly backed off to a corner of the room to observe.

The family doctor, a nearly mute and highly scrupulous man, arrived within the half hour upon being told that there was a baby related emergency, and quickly began to examine the little girl. They chose the kitchen as the setting for the examination because of its bright lighting. He took her pulse, listened to her lungs and heart, examined her arms and legs. "No signs of rashes, respiratory illnesses, or heart murmurs," he described his examination softly to them. "Everything is fully formed. Possibility of impaired eyesight. Is her mother available?"

Alfred cleared her throat. "No, I'm afraid not. She's going to need some formula. That's possible, right?"

The doctor nodded and wrote down the name of a very high grade, nutrition rich formula specifically for premature babies. Then he produced a sample of the same concoction and a spare baby bottle. Alfred moved over to the sink to warm it up. Alfred naturally expected he'd be the one caring for the tiny infant. Robin expected something similar. Bruce had probably also expected something similar. But within seconds of leaving her side, Alfred had been replaced by an extraordinarily anxious father, who scooped up the baby girl as carefully as if she were made of glass and rice paper. When Alfred came back to them, and without prompting or instruction, the young Wayne took the bottle from Alfred's hand, and brought the tip to his daughter's mouth.

The rest of the room looked on in surprised amazement. No one was about to interrupt.

It took five days for him to remember he was on the Joker's tail and ought to be doing some reconnaissance.

* * *

><p>Less than a week ago, Bruce Wayne had snidely remarked that Alfred wished a great many things about his life were different. At the time, Robin hadn't thought much of it; he knew settling down was the last thing from Batman's mind. Sometimes, Robin thought, a man was possessed of <em>action<em>, not _needs_. Bruce and Robin were both that type of man. They had to be _doing_ something; making, fighting, investigating, overturning; and simply _experiencing_ life and satisfying personal needs didn't interest them at all.

Now Batman hadn't settled down in the week since then. But something else had happened in that time period, something that had delayed Bruce's first reconnaissance mission on the Joker until just that morning. Something big. Something ironic. Something that was currently shrieking its tiny lungs off.

Robin stood in the doorway of the kitchen, staring dismayed and helpless as Alfred desperately tried to reassure the little girl. He bounced her and rocked her, and by all accounts Alfred was simply phenomenal with children. But no matter the tactic he employed, the little girl continued to scream. She was as resilient to his nurturing as he was resilient to her screams. The only non-resilient person in the room was Robin, who winced and cringed at every caterwaul, and who desperately wished he knew some means of helping.

"What's _wrong_ with her?" he asked. "Is she sick?"

Alfred was clearly perplexed by the infant's behavior. Until a certain age, all babies were more or less the same as all other babies. They had a couple quirks here and there, and some were more temperamental than others, but rare was the child who refused all offers of ceasefire and affection and who chose instead to shriek ceaselessly to the heavens. "The doctor gave her a very thorough examination," Alfred reminded him. "And-"

"Yeah yeah, great. Then what's she so pissed off about?" Robin grimaced. "She's never done this before!"

Alfred sighed, looking over the child with a practiced eye. But try as he might, he couldn't determine what was upsetting her. She didn't have a cold, a fever, or any pain that he could localize. She had no rash. She was currently naked on the off-chance that her diaper had been upsetting her. At first he was ready to tell Robin that children didn't simply get 'pissed off' and that to ascribe malicious intent to a baby was ridiculous. Babies were babies were...

But then a thought occurred to him. A rash of memories sifted through his mind, cherry picked from many different times in his life. Possessed of a sudden curiosity, Alfred tucked the screaming babe against his shoulder and headed for the laundry room. Robin followed, pained but curious. As he watched, the old butler sifted through the bins, pulled out an unwashed but still relatively clean shirt, and then draped it gently over the little girl's face.

The baby shrieked, hiccuped, sniffled, and then mumbled softly. She reached out with pudgy little fingers that wavered uncoordinated through the air, brushing against the fabric. Then she put her fingers in her mouth. Within moment, she was fast asleep on Alfred's shoulder.

Robin's face screwed up in baffled realization. "You gave her one of his shirts?" he asked in a whisper. He now knew (from experience) that babies rarely remained asleep for very long, and that if he were particularly quiet it might be a full hour before _this_ one would wake up again.

Alfred rocked the little girl worriedly. "I think she can smell him on it," he explained.

Robin fidgeted. "Is that... normal for a baby?"

Alfred hesitated. "Not _exactly_..." He sighed. "But then we really don't know much about her unique circumstances... Or her mother's."

"So she'll chill out when he comes back?"

Alfred looked up at the clock, knowing full well that Bruce was very late and had obviously spent the entire night stalking some unsuspecting runaway PTA father. Neither he nor Robin had gotten much sleep that night, nor any hour of the day afterward.

When they suddenly heard the study door open, the two of them both turned quickly to face it. Bruce stepped through, dressed in his regulars. At his side was a dazed looking Harley. She was still partially in costume and leaning heavily on his shoulder for support while he pressed an ice pack gently to the side of her head.

Robin jumped at the sight of her and then swore when he realized it meant. Harley _had_ found out. Oh man, was he in for an earful. _Especially_ since it looked like she'd gotten hurt. "What happened?!" he asked, hoping to divert the Bat's attention from his failure. "It wasn't him was it?"

Harley laughed and it made her head hurt. She moaned feebly and Bruce gave Robin a deathly glare. "Help me get her to the couch, John," he ordered. Robin grimaced and nodded, coming up to take her other arm. Together the two of them got Harley safely to the couch and laid her down. Bruce had already tended to her down in the caves it seemed, as she had bandages on her head, chest, arms, and throat. He must have left the costume on because she was too dazed to properly dress herself.

"Well?" Robin asked after Harley was situated and Bruce had made sure she was comfortable. "What happened?" Bruce shot him another dark look.

"He'll already have disappeared again by now," Bruce told him. Then he caught sight of Alfred who was wearing a curious expression. He noticed both the old man and Robin had circles under his eyes. Then he noticed that the little girl was once more draped in an old shirt. "Alfred, what happened? Laundry machine break?"

Alfred blinked and looked to the little girl. He smiled slightly and then slowly pulled the shirt from around her and held it off to his left side. Within moment the little girl had perked up and was making fussing noises. Robin cringed, and then sighed when the baby burst into a full-blown wail. Harley moaned at the sound. Bruce jumped to his feet in surprise. Amused, Alfred placed the child directly into her father's arms. The little girl squirmed momentarily, blinked hazily, and then cooed and smeared her face into her father's chest, rooting for sustenance.

Bruce stared down at her in surprise, then lifted his head to look at Alfred.

Alfred beamed. "She just missed her daddy, Bruce."

Thinking back on the events of the evening before, and of the week before that, Batman closed his eyes and gave a heavy sigh.

"What about the mission?" Robin prompted again, leaning over Harley and adjusting her ice pack to make sure she was benefiting from it. "What happened? Was it him? Did you even see him? Did you lose him? Who hurt Harley?"

"It was him," Harley croaked. Robin jumped. Alfred paled and looked first to her, then questioningly to Master Wayne.

Bruce opened his eyes and looked back to the injured woman. Harley was looking up at him desperately, eyes round.

"It was him," she repeated morosely. "He t-tried to k-kill me..."

"Easy Harleen. We can talk later."

"Why would he... why would he..."

"Hold up," Robin grasped, "that guy really _was_ the Joker? The hell has he been doing?!"

"Hiding," the Bat answered cryptically. "Get a hold of Fox. The girl's name is 'Buttercup' and I need him to ransack our databases trying to find out who she is and where she came from. Harleen, please rest. We'll talk once you've recovered from your concussion."

"But if it's the Joker we need to go after him!" Robin protested. "You should have called me, I-"

"No one is going after him!" Bruce said loudly, firmly, and Harleen quivered. He winced and looked apologetically after her, before taking in her and Robin both. "This situation is delicate. _No one_ is to track him down alone. Don't drop his name to anyone, don't tip anyone else off that he might be alive. This stays secret, and _no one_ moves to find him except _exactly_ as I say so."

Robin blinked in surprise, hesitated, but then nodded and went to call Fox. Harley just sighed miserably and rolled her face into the rear of the couch. Alfred still looked at Bruce questioningly. The Bat noticed his gaze, took in a slow breath, and then gestured for Alfred to follow him out of the room. When they were beyond Harley's earshot and a door had been closed between them, Bruce turned back towards the butler.

"Alfred, did you bring a baby carrier into the house recently?" he asked.

Alfred blinks. "I did, sir. Just about three days ago. Why?"

Bruce nodded; the Joker hadn't been bluffing. "Someone noticed," he told him. "And the Joker's been watching us extremely carefully these whole six years."

Alfred straightened. "You mean... he knows... about...?" Then he frowned. "But if he's been watching us, why hasn't he ever done anything?"

Bruce looked down at the little girl who had fallen asleep against his chest. Then he looked up at Alfred in confusion.

"Alfred... He's not hiding. He's hiding _her_."

"You mean the girl? This 'Buttercup,' the same girl he stole?"

"And he says he legally adopted her."

Alfred frowned. "That doesn't sound like the 'Joker' you're familiar with. That unfortunate person had no empathy for anything, man, woman, or child... and just wanted to watch the world burn."

"When I asked him what he was doing and how I could just leave her with him, he told me as a new father I should 'get it.' "

Alfred was quiet a long moment, regarding the young Master Wayne with new eyes. After a moment, he nodded. "I think you need to know a great deal about a little girl named 'Buttercup,' and you need to know it fast."

"You believe me now?" Bruce asked, slightly surprised.

"Of course."

"Why?"

"Because that sort of story is so insane, even you couldn't be making it up now could you?"


	13. Chapter 13

It was nine o'clock in the evening, and an hour past Terra Smith's bedtime, but she was still she was awake. She had tiptoed to the bathroom door, and now watched as her father smeared black greasepaint over his face. He caught sight of her in the reflection, and slanted green eyes looked back at her in surprise. There was a predatory look to him as the Father waned and the Clown Prince waxed.

Terra frowned curiously. "That's not your costume," she noted, observing the modest and carefully wrapped black stealth outfit that her father was wearing. The clown hesitated for a moment.

"No," he answered in a slightly reedy tenor. "Not here. Too much trouble for a face like that." He considered his makeup and then gave a languid, "You should be in bed, you know."

Instead of responding to that, Terra stepped into the bathroom. She felt her father tense up in a peculiar way, as if he were both interested and afraid. Concerned, but emboldened now that a line had been crossed, Terra came up to the man and put her arms about his waist, hugging him tightly. A moment of mute conflict passed. Then the clown hugged her; tightly and without any disdain or further hesitation.

"Something on your mind?" he asked her, his voice stronger. The earthy tone reassured her; she'd never approached him while he was getting ready to 'go out' before.

"I don't think you're raising me right," she blurted boldly.

Her father flinched like she'd struck him. "What?"

Terra lifted her head, looking up at him with frustrated eyes. His eyes were wide with surprise and some trepidation. "I don't get to be normal," she told him. "I don't get to have friends for very long, or even keep the same name or eye color. Every time I look in the mirror, my reflection is different. I like school, I like other people... but... but..."

Her father swallowed hard. "But...?"

"... I _do _want to learn _some _normal things... But if you try to raise me like I'm normal everywhere we go... I just feel like something's missing."

"I..." the clown's face went through a gamut of uncertain expressions. Like any other parent, he'd been confronted with the moods and temperament of a growing child. He knew better than to let his entire emotional state hinge on his daughter's words anymore. After a moment he rubbed her back. "What do you want?" he asked her sincerely.

She seemed to think, grabbing hold of whatever idea it was that had urged her to approach him. Her eyes lowered for a moment, then returned to his face. "If I have to be abnormal, maybe I need lessons in abnormality."

Clown and father were both uncertain where this was going, although they each marveled at the way their daughter's vocabulary was rapidly expanding. "Like... what, exactly?"

"If we're going to be a family of ninjas, then I think you have to teach me to be a ninja," she decided, poking his clothing.

"No," he answered, paternal fierceness overwhelming anything else. "You shouldn't have to be a part of any of that."

She frowned. "I'm a ninja whether you teach me or not, aren't I? You can't teach a ninja only how to be a princess and expect it to work out well. Do we ever get to be normal? Ever? One day I'm gonna grow up and I need to know what to do."

Her father's expression had become more pained as she spoke, and now there was a note of panic in it. "You can't-" he began, then broke off and bit his lip. "Not tonight, you... " he shook his head and then buried her in a tight hug, smearing some black paint on her.

"Dad...?"

He took in a long, shuddering breath, and then nodded into her hair. "_Slowly_," he told her. She hugged him tighter immediately. "Not by bringing you with me. Not _tonight_. Not like so quickly. Slowly."

There weren't words for how grateful that made her. Terra snuggled close to her father, listening to his rapid heartbeat. He was the strongest and most capable person she knew, in every way she knew of. His fear always made her feel vulnerable and helpless; helpless to understand the way they flit about the country or hid their faces from the world.

"What's been eating you?" he asked in a more level tone after a moment, though she could feel his heart rate had not yet settled. "Something at school?"

Terra pulled back a little from his embrace. After a moment of consideration, she picked up his greasepaint kit, dabbed some black up, and began applying it to his face. The clown blinked in surprise but held still for her, closing his eyes so she could make sure the application was thorough.

"Squirt?" he asked.

"You're going to get a letter from the school asking for a parent-teacher conference," Terra said at last. Mr. Smith perked up and blinked at her in confusion. Although the two of them rarely discussed Terra's gift, she ought to have foreseen any trouble with the teachers long before she'd stumbled into a parent-teacher conference scenario.

"What happened?" he asked.

"We were doing an assignment today about Halloween. The subject had to do with costumes. We drew pictures, and wrote about who we wanted to dress as and why. When I realized I was going to get in trouble, I wanted to know why. I didn't realize how much trouble till it was too late for me to fix without lying. And I don't lie just cause other people are dumb."

He furrowed his brow at first, then smirked. "What did you do...?" he teased.

"Thing's are different here. The teachers in New York didn't mind if I dressed up as the Green Goblin. Well, I said I wanted to go as the Joker," she told him. "She said I was 'disturbed'. I had to look up what she meant in a dictionary. Weirdo lady."

He brought out laughing almost hysterically and then hugged his daughter tightly and ruffled her hair. "I'm going to find that conversation hilarious."

"I don't want to move again!" Terra protested, dabbing his chin with the paint. "I'm just starting to make some friends!"

He laughed again. "I'll behave. Promise. No moving for a bit." He tweaked her nose.

"You're not doing anything bad tonight?" she asked hopefully.

"When men sneak around in black ninja outfits, something risky is going on," he joked. "But don't worry. I'll be watching, not fighting. The parent-teacher conference... that's what made you ask about 'abnormality?'"

"I guess I did it to myself," she confessed, "even though I knew better, my teacher made me frustrated, so I argued anyway. I guess what bothered me was when I realized how afraid she was of anything strange. Then suddenly I understood: I'm just different from her. I need to know more about hero and villain stuff than she does. She just wants to hide from it, heroes included."

Mr. Smith looked off at nothing as she spoke, and then slowly looked back to her, his gaze thoughtful and sympathetic. "I didn't mean to make your life like this. Abnormal. Hiding."

Terra looked up at him in surprise. "I don't want to be like _her._ She's just a control freak. She _needs_ everything to be normal, or she has a temper tantrum. And I'm supposed to be the kid! What's she going to do in an emergency or disaster, like a tornado? Yell the tornado to death? She's crazy, she just doesn't know it."

The clown smirked appreciatively. "Well, I certainly can't let your only education come from crazy people. We'll start 'special' lessons after school. Deal?"

"Deal." She kissed his cheek where the paint was already dry from his earlier application. "There, you're done. Be safe?" He took a look in the mirror, examining himself before grunting in approval and tugging up a scarf over his mouth and nose.

"Honeybee, I'm on _my_ turf. Really, I'm as safe as can be."

"Then don't make a dumb mess up," she teased the adult. He ruffled her hair and then headed for the bedroom window and off into the night. "I love you!"

He blinked and peered back at her, almost completely hidden against the dark sky. At eight years old, Terra Smith was much taller and more mature than the little girl he'd first adopted. But her face was still round, her limbs like little string beans, and her baby teeth no more than minute white beads. She was still so small, so vulnerable. He had to go. He had to go, to make sure things were in place to keep them safe hidden. Still his heart clenched at the sudden realization that he was leaving her alone and defenseless for the night. "I love you," he echoed her softly, and then turned off into the darkness.

Maybe it was for the best that he taught her a few things.

* * *

><p>When Mr. Smith entered the kitchen the next morning, he set about his usual routine. He grabbed his various cooking components as he walked past; the skillet, a spatula, a jug of orange juice, five eggs and an onion- he shut the refrigerator door with his foot- and an apron. He was juggling all of these materials quite admirably and was midway through heating up the skillet and stirring up an omelet when he noticed his daughter was already up. She was seated at the kitchen table, her chin hovering over steepled fingers, elbows over a newspaper, a stern expression on her face.<p>

Mr. Smith gulped. _What did I do?_

"Um... Goodmorning?" he hazarded.

Terra gave him a look to end all looks. She rolled up the newspaper, sauntered up to him, and offered it to him like a scroll. Mr. Smith blinked and settled down the omelet bowl, taking the newspaper in both hands.

SUSPICIOUS MAN IN BLACK; RESPONSIBLE FOR MISSING FORTUNE?

Mr. Smith looked up at his daughter. "Don't worry," he tried to reassure. "No one traced this back to us. We don't have to move. I-"

"I want a pony."

Mr. Smith paused. "New hockey gear," he haggled.

"New hockey gear AND a pony."

Not fair, she was cheating. "New hockey gear and another rabbit," he protested.

Terra eyed him with wisdom beyond her years, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. "A sugar glider," she counter offered.

"A what?" Terra reached into her back jeans pocket and pulled out a folded color picture she'd printed at the school library. Depicted were baby flying squirrels with attached phone numbers and birth dates. Mr. Smith blinked at the pictures and then looked at Terra in amazement. "How long did you hold on to this hand?" he asked the mischievous-looking eight year old.

Terra giggled. "I was waiting for the ace, Daddy. _Obviously!_"

"Then you're not mad at me?"

"Ni! You will atone for your crimes," she said with the aire of a decadent princess, "with my new baby sugar glider, serf!"

Mr. Smith broke out laughing and heaved her off the ground, tossing her gently into the air and catching her again. "Where'd that come from?!" he laughed. "Have you been watching the history channel again?"

"Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!"

"I leave you alone with screens too frequently," he decided. "How is that possible when I home-school you on the weekends, and have no job?"

"I have a brain the size of a planet! And a Time-Turner! Now fetch me a shrubbery, or I shall say 'Ni' at you a second time!"


	14. Chapter 14

'Super' was an interesting word. From Latin, it most directly meant 'over' or 'above.' In English, the world tended to sound slightly phony and plastic. It reeked of an earlier and more naive time in history, of plastered smiles over teetering catastrophe. So it was that the compound word 'super hero' tended to feel phony on his lips. It was an absurd word, as impressive as a roll of cellophane, and so was 'super villain.' Still, one supposed both compounds were necessary distinctions.

After all a 'hero' was merely a fireman, a mother, or a stalwart police officer. The world 'super hero' was necessary for that certain class of people who went far beyond mundaneheroism, people who could not live normal human lives. These 'super heroes' were the Spartans of modern underworld combat; their profession was (in a manner of speaking) war.

Likewise, where 'villain' was a word to describe dramatically compelling antagonists, their profession could be banker, assassin, teacher, or step mother. But a super villain-.

TCHK-flp.

Terra frowned at the largely unblemished target in disappointment. "I missed _again_," she complained, dismayed by the array of metal scattered about the target's base. Mr. Smith grinned, brought back to reality by the high-pitched whine of his daughter's voice. He leaned over her and slipped another throwing knife gently into her fingers. His own hand closed about her, carefully positioning her fingertips and knuckles.

"It's not about thinking," he told her, "it's not deduction, it doesn't use your brain. It's _feeling_. You do it long enough and you get a feel for it." He grasped her shoulders tightly, turning her a bit. "Your fingers start doing the thinking for you. And then you just keep challenging them, giving goals just a little farther, a little farther..."

"But I can't even get a knife to stick!" she complained. "What am I don't wrong?

"Don't worry so much, Squirt," he teased, ducking to kiss the top of her head. "D'ya have any idea how long it took you to learn your first word? Well. The second word was easier."

She glanced at him hopefully and then took a deep breath.

"Not so much mental preparation and build up. Just guide it through the first few paces of the journey. Let it go, see what it does. Watch it the whole way. Watch its shape when it strikes. You're going for something like this." He moved her body through the motions, her arms, her legs.

Terra nodded and came back to her starting position. She gave it another try, casting the next knife in her best mimicry of her father's motions. The hilt of the blade struck the target, and the weapon bounced harmlessly off. She swore.

"Whoa!" Alarmed, Mr. Smith grabbed her cheeks and tilted her head back up to look at him. "None of that," he chastised, patting her cheek sternly.

Terra blushed, frustrated. "How do you do it?"

"Learned the same way you did, kid: throwing a knife and failing over and over and over again. Now throw the rest, clean up, stab the target a couple times till you feel better, and then it's time for something completely different."

"Blah, I'm never going to be able to focus," She complained. "Is it math? I'm never going to be able to focus."

"No worries. I have ice-cream ready. Once more?"

Terra perked up at the mention of a light at the end of her tunnel. She nodded and carefully reached for the next knife. This time, the weapon stuck.

"Yesss!"

"Ha! Very good. Now don't get mad when the next one doesn't stick; we've got fun things to do later!"

"Are we making fire today?" Terra asked eagerly, looking back at her father and grabbing another knife.

Mr. Smith lifted a brow. "I'm sorry, who are you talking to? Me? Of _course_ we're making fire today. I went to all the trouble to set up that workplace, didn't I? I want to show you how sawmills can explode! Then we'll make bismuth crystals and turn them into cosmetics and gastrointestinal medications."

Terra looked up at him, as if waiting for something.

Her father tapped his chin, feeling like he was forgetting something. "Oh yes!" it suddenly occurred to him. "How could I forget? Pyrotechnics! Bismuth is wonderful for making dragon's eggs pyrotechnics stars..."

"Where are we going to shoot off fireworks!?" Terra asked in alarm.

"Alas, but I shall not reveal my master plan so early! Now, aim!"

Most 'supers' were loners; they worked together only when necessary, and avoided interpersonal relationships with laymen like the plague. At worse they were antisocial, and at best they couldn't be everywhere at once and lacked the omnipresence necessary to protect the people they cared for. If- and it was rare- they tried to start a family, they usually had to vanish. Certain 'supers' like Bats and Ra's could train underlings, companions, and replacements. They were used to sharing what they knew, whether it was with blooming 'supers' or hand-picked goons.

But truth be told, the Joker had never shared his craft with much of anyone. Harley had learned through observation; his goons he had left as unaware and incapable as possible. Teaching his craft, his profession, _war_, to anyone was strange to him. Teaching Terra was strangest of all. He thought of some of the things he had done to the world; some of the ways he'd taken lives or convinced brainless goons to swallow explosives for him.

"Elbow," he called, prompting her to make a small correction.

As Terra's next knife struck home on the target, Mr. Smith couldn't suppress a shiver. She was right: anyone who could predict the future (and predict it she could, based on how she was now hitting every knife successfully into the target) was never going to be able to live a normal life. Still, the more he shared with her, the more he remembered there was a whole lot of _ugly_ he didn't really want her to see.

_She's going to see it eventually. She'll get on the internet and read old police files; _if_ I don't end up killing someone in front of her first._

_What says she'll mind? She could end up like me. She did ask to go as the Joker for Halloween._

The clown made a face of displeasure. He would rather another Bats than another Harley. At least the former would make for years of fun dramatic tension. And as for her being like the Joker? Hmph. There could only be one.

* * *

><p>"He really gave us the slip," Robin noted. "Makes sense, he's been perfecting the art for... how long now?"<p>

Bruce was quiet, making a paper airplane out of the bill for his new Lamborghini. He was anticipating the delivery of the vehicle with the same excitement as he might anticipate a good cup of coffee. It was expected of him to indulge, and so he did; buying the four million dollar vehicle off the cuff. He attended many functions and one of them had featured a high end auto show. There, compared to the latest Dolorian-esque Ferrari and Pagani, the black Lamborghini Veneno had an angular, aggressive shape to it that reminded him of a certain roof-jumping tank. He'd liked it. He threw the paper airplane.

"You don't seem very concerned," his second noticed, folding his arms over his chest.

"Hmm?" Bruce glanced at him.

Robin scowled. "Don't give me that, I'm not your adoring public. You haven't seem very invested in tracking down you-know-who for awhile now. Big change for a guy who was obsessed over this for years."

Bruce shrugged.

"Like I _said_, that act doesn't work on me."

Mr. Wayne eyed Robin for a moment. Then he sat forward on his desk and leaned his elbows on the wood top, interlacing his fingers. "What's wrong?" he asked.

"That's what I'm asking you," Robin retorted. "It's like you've lost the heart for fighting. Ever since-" he trailed off.

"Ever since... what, Robin?"

The younger man scowled.

"Ever since... Helena was born?"

Robin said nothing.

Bruce smirked. "Ever since Helena was born it's like I've settled down. I've tended to the buisness, moved around assets, secured financial holdings. It's like Batman's been on the decline and... suddenly I'm _only_ Bruce Wayne? Like suddenly now that there's a child, I'm worried about mundane things instead of my _real_ job. Instead of the real villains out there."

His second sneered, pouted, then shrugged. "Well _you_ said it."

Mr. Wayne smirked. "Do you want to take over, then?"

"No! I want the Dark Knight to fight!" Robin protested. "What's _wrong_ with you? Is it really the kid? You haven't gotten off your ass for a week!"

"Bold claim. Not without some evidence to support it, I suppose, but one that could get you in a lot of trouble if you start trying to prove something to me." He tapped his lips with his pointer fingers splayed as Robin grimaced, annoyed with the patronizing tone he perceived in the older man's words. "How about this," he said at last, sitting up and then leaning confidently back into his chair. "If I prove to you I haven't lost my edge, you drop the matter. And you _definitely _drop blaming Helena." His voice suddenly had a hard edge at that last point.

Robin grimaced but shrugged. "You're on, Bats."

Bruce smiled. He reached into his breast pocket, pulled out three photographs, and tossed them across the table. The younger man blinked and picked the closer one up, looking at it uncertainly. "A kid? What-" He frowned and, not wanting to look like a fool, he picked up the second photograph. This one was a duplicate of the first, but it had been edited. The hair had been swapped out and the eye color changed. Listed around the picture were notes like a brand of eye contact or prosthetic skin. Unmistakably, the second photograph was of Veronica Peterson. Robin blinked and then grabbed the third photograph. This one had been tailored into the shape of Marcy Adams.

Robin lifted his head and looked at Bruce- Batman- in surprise and alarm.

"The kid- Buttercup- You know where she is," he exclaimed. "Where is she?"

"Where I can keep an eye on her," the Batman said with a smirk, reaching into his desk to pull out a fine brand of cigar and a golden lighter. "Smoke?" he offered one to the younger man.

"And... and _him_?" the boy pressed, ignoring the offer.

"Well, probably best for your health that you didn't start," he decided, and it only took a split second for Robin to realize he wasn't just talking about smoking cigars. His face blushed with anger and embarrassment at this subtle jab at his accidental leak to Fruit Bat on the Joker's whereabouts.

"You're just letting him walk around!?" the younger man stammered. "I could help you! Is this seriously about Harley? That was over a year ago! Or are you worried you'll fail and he'll come after Helena? That's ridiculous, one of us could watch over her while the others-!"

"We had a deal," the Batman noted. "Firstly for you to drop the matter, and secondly to stop bringing Helena into the conversation."

"But-!"

"Didn't I hold up my end of the bargain?" Bruce asked. "Didn't I prove to you I'm still who you signed up to follow?"

Robin hesitated.

"Then maybe you should just trust that I know what I'm doing. It would be a nice start, you know. My household trusting me. You know like trusting me not to be lazy... Not to be insane... Not to see imaginary Jokers..."

The younger man sighed. He had just been completely played into a trap of obedient silence; his own personal form of hell. Clearly, whether he was Batman or Bruce Wayne, a certain dark-haired billionaire had not lost his game. With a defeated slump of his shoulders, Robin sank down into the chair opposite Batman, a begrudging respect working its way over his face.

"One day you're going to get killed because _you_ didn't trust anyone enough to not die while helping you," the younger man muttered.

Batman shrugged. "Maybe I would if you'd all stop nearly dying while helping me." He grinned, because he was mostly teasing.

Robin made a face.

"I think I'm going to start reading Helena _The Hobbit_." Bruce mused aloud. "Plenty of good lessons on heroism in there. And ones in stupidity. And a good depiction of the dangers involved when provoking sleeping dragons..."

Robin made another face.


End file.
